Chinese Radicals — all 100, one page each

A radical (部首 bùshǒu) is the component a dictionary files a character under — and it usually carries a clue to the meaning. Once you know that 氵 is water, you can guess that 河, 海, 湖 and 洗 are river, sea, lake and wash before you have ever met them.

There are a few hundred radicals in real circulation and roughly 40 of them do most of the work — they are starred in the table below. Learning those first turns character study from memorising thousands of unrelated shapes into recognising combinations of a small set of parts.

Ordered by stroke count, the way a radical dictionary lists them — which is exactly how you look up a character whose pronunciation you cannot guess. Simplified radicals (讠钅纟饣) are listed with their traditional source in the smaller grey glyph.

What is a Chinese radical?

A radical (部首 bùshǒu) is the component a dictionary files a character under, and it usually hints at the meaning. 氵 marks water words (河 river, 海 sea, 洗 to wash), 讠 marks speech (说 to speak, 话 words), 艹 marks plants (花 flower, 茶 tea). Recognising the radical is how you look up a character you cannot pronounce.

How many Chinese radicals are there?

The traditional Kangxi system has 214. Simplified Chinese dictionaries typically use around 200, since some radicals merged and new simplified forms (讠, 钅, 纟, 饣) appeared. In practice about 40 do most of the work in everyday text, and this hub covers the 100 that matter for reading modern Chinese.

Which radicals should I learn first?

The starred ones in the table: 人/亻 person, 口 mouth, 氵 water, 讠 speech, 艹 grass, 木 tree, 女 woman, 心/忄 heart, 手/扌 hand, 日 sun, 月 moon/flesh, 钅 metal, 纟 silk, 辶 movement and 宀 roof. Between them they appear in a large share of the characters in HSK 1–4.

Is the radical always on the left of a character?

No. It can sit on the left (河), the right (刂 in 别), the top (艹 in 花), the bottom (心 in 想), around the outside (囗 in 国) or wrap the corner (广 in 床). And a character can contain a radical without being filed under it — 落 is filed under 艹 but also contains 氵 inside 洛.