不得了

不得了 bùdéliǎo

Serious (extremely)

不得了 in a sentence HSK 5 budeliao

What 不得了 means

  1. Serious (extremely)

These meanings come from the same dictionary that powers the Chinese to Pinyin translator and the Chinese to English translator, so a whole sentence containing 不得了 will read it the same way this page does.

Recognise a piece of 不得了 but not the character it belongs to? Pick the parts in the component character finder and it will name the character for you — free for every character, with nothing to sign in to.

Character by character

不得了 is written with 3 characters. Chinese words are usually easier to remember once you can see what each part contributes.

不
bù
No (not)
得
dé / děi / de
Get; Have to (need)
了
le / liǎo / liào
(past tense indicator); finish (end)

How to write 不得了

Stroke order is not decoration — it is what makes handwriting legible and what dictionary lookup by stroke count depends on.

Practise 不得了 on printable 田字格 sheets, trace it in the writing practice tool, or watch any other character in the Stroke Order Animator.

不得了 in a sentence

他高兴得不得了。
Tā gāoxìng de bùdéliǎo.
He was extremely happy.
外面热得不得了。
Wàimiàn rè de bùdéliǎo.
It is terribly hot outside.

Every sentence on this site that uses 不得了 is collected on the 不得了 sentence page. Want pinyin above a sentence of your own? Paste it into the Pinyin Annotator.

Questions about 不得了

What does 不得了 mean in English?

不得了 is pronounced bùdéliǎo and means Serious (extremely).

How do you pronounce 不得了?

不得了 is bùdéliǎo in pinyin — written budeliao without tone marks. Press the audio button on this page to hear it spoken by a native voice.

What are the characters in 不得了?

不得了 is written with 3 characters: 不 (bù) No (not), 得 (dé / děi / de) Get; Have to (need), 了 (le / liǎo / liào) (past tense indicator); finish (end). Knowing the parts is usually how the whole word becomes memorable.

Is 不得了 an HSK word?

Yes — 不得了 is on the official HSK 5 vocabulary list. You can study it with the rest of that list on the HSK 5 page.

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