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100 Most Common Chinese Characters

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  • From past to present, there is no accurate counting of Chinese characters. Depending upon how one counts variants, 50,000+ is a good approximation for the current total number.
  • However, it is generally accepted that one needs to know between 2,000 to 3500 characters for basic literacy in Chinese (for example, to read a Chinese newspaper), and a well-educated person will know well in excess of 4,000 to 5,000 characters.
  • There have been several attempt to identify the most frequently used Chinese characters.  In 1988,  the Chinese government has published a list of the 3,500 most frequently used Simplified Chinese characters : 现代汉语常用字表 (“List of Frequently Used Characters in Modern Chinese”).
  • As you may notice, each daily character post found in this website includes the usage of the character. The usage/frequency that I used in this website is based on the statistic found in here :  Frequency Statistics 频率统计
  • To maximize the speed to achieve reading literacy, the student should learn the most commonly used characters first.
  • According to a survey on the current situation of Chinese language, to understand 90% of the content in Chinese publications, students have to learn only about 900 Chinese characters and 11,000 phrases/words
  • Chinese characters should not be confused with Chinese words. Most Chinese words are written with one or more characters; each character representing one syllable. Knowing the meanings of the individual characters of a word will often allow the general meaning of the word to be inferred, but this is not invariably the case.
  • Here are the 100 most frequently used characters that we have learnt, making up around 40% of the usage of Chinese.
Character Usage Pinyin Pronunciation Date/Link
1 的 95.9 de
04-Sep-2009
2 一 94.3 yī
11-Jul-2009
3 是 93.0 shì
28-Jul-2009
4 不 91.8 bù
08-May-2009
5 了 90.7 le
30-Jun-2009
6 在 89.7 zài
16-Sep-2009
7 人 88.7 rén
29-Jun-2009
8 有 87.8 yǒu
23-Feb-2010
9 我 86.9 wǒ
21-May-2009
10 他 86.1 tā
25-May-2009
11 这 85.3 zhè
03-Aug-2009
12 个 84.7 gè
31-Jul-2009
13 们 84.1 men
29-May-2009
14 中 83.5 zhōng
02-Nov-2009
15 来 82.9 lái
05-Jun-2009
16 上 82.4 shàng
12-May-2009
17 大 81.8 dà
02-Sep-2009
18 为 81.3 wèi
03-Nov-2009
19 和 80.8 hé
04-Nov-2009
20 国 80.3 guó
09-Nov-2009
21 地 79.8 dì
20-Nov-2009
22 到 79.3 dào
27-Nov-2009
23 以 78.8 yǐ
09-Dec-2009
24 说 78.4 shuō
05-Nov-2009
25 时 77.9 shí
10-Nov-2009
26 要 77.5 yào
30-Oct-2009
27 就 77.1 jiù
18-Dec-2009
28 出 76.7 chū
18-Sep-2009
29 会 76.3 huì
11-Nov-2009
30 可 76.0 kě
12-Nov-2009
31 也 75.6 yě
03-Jun-2009
32 你 75.2 nǐ
22-May-2009
33 对 74.9 duì
13-Nov-2009
34 生 74.5 shēng
30-Jul-2009
35 能 74.2 néng
30-Nov-2009
36 而 73.8 ér
07-Jan-2010
37 子 73.5 zǐ
24-Feb-2010
38 那 73.2 nà
04-Aug-2009
39 得 72.8 dé
11-Dec-2009
40 于 72.5 yú
08-Feb-2010
41 着 72.2 zhe
01-Dec-2009
42 下 71.9 xià
13-May-2009
43 自 71.6 zì
26-Jan-2010
44 之 71.2 zhī
20-Jan-2010
45 年 70.9 nián
07-Sep-2009
46 过 70.6 guò
19-Nov-2009
47 发 70.3 fā
23-Nov-2009
48 后 70.0 hòu
19-Jun-2009
49 作 69.8 zuò
24-Jun-2009
50 里 69.5 lǐ
09-Feb-2010
51 用 69.2 yòng
25-Jan-2010
52 道 68.9 dào
18-Feb-2010
53 行 68.7 xíng
23-Oct-2009
54 所 68.4 suǒ
15-Feb-2010
55 然 68.1 rán
05-Feb-2010
56 家 67.9 jiā
14-Aug-2009
57 种 67.6 zhòng
11-Jan-2010
58 事 67.3 shì
01-Feb-2010
59 成 67.1 chéng
28-Jan-2010
60 方 66.8 fāng
24-Nov-2009
61 多 66.6 duō
17-Nov-2009
62 经 66.3 jīng
10-Feb-2010
63 么 66.1 me
23-Jul-2009
64 去 65.8 qù
12-Aug-2009
65 法 65.5 fǎ
10-Dec-2009
66 学 65.4 xué
29-Jul-2009
67 如 65.1 rú
12-Jan-2010
68 都 64.9 dōu
04-Jun-2009
69 同 64.7 tóng
16-Nov-2009
70 现 64.4 xiàn
04-Jan-2010
71 当 64.2 dāng
25-Feb-2010
72 没 64.0 méi
22-Feb-2010
73 动 63.8 dòng
07-Dec-2009
74 面 63.6 miàn
17-Dec-2009
75 起 63.3 qǐ
22-Jan-2010
76 看 63.1 kàn
20-Aug-2009
77 定 62.9 dìng
05-Jan-2010
78 天 62.7 tiān
17-Jun-2009
79 分 62.5 fēn
19-Jan-2010
80 还 62.3 hái
06-Jan-2010
81 进 62.0 jìn
17-Sep-2009
82 好 61.8 hǎo
04-May-2009
83 小 61.6 xiǎo
03-Sep-2009
84 部 61.4 bù
12-Feb-2010
85 其 61.2 qí
04-Dec-2009
86 些 61.0 xiē
03-Feb-2010
87 主 60.8 zhǔ
29-Jan-2010
88 样 60.6 yàng
08-Jan-2010
89 理 60.4 lǐ
27-Jan-2010
90 心 60.2 xīn
26-Nov-2009
91 她 60.0 tā
26-May-2009
92 本 59.8 běn
08-Dec-2009
93 前 59.6 qián
18-Jun-2009
94 开 59.4 kāi
25-Nov-2009
95 但 59.2 dàn
02-Dec-2009
96 因 59.0 yīn
15-Jan-2010
97 只 58.8 zhǐ
03-Dec-2009
98 从 58.6 cóng
06-Nov-2009
99 想 58.4 xiǎng
18-Aug-2009
100 实 58.2 shí
14-Dec-2009

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80 thoughts on “100 Most Common Chinese Characters”

    1. Hi rusty,
      You have to click on the date link to go to the details page for the English meaning of each characters.
      I will try to improve this page by adding a short English meaning for each characters.
      Thanks for your suggestion. I hope you will enjoy learning Chinese.

      Reply

      1. Min Min, where are you? Where does one start with this language? The sounds to my ear are so difficult to hear, let alone pronounce. May I please hear from you.
        Best regards,
        J.Hart

        Reply

      2. Hi J.Hart,
        Do you mean the pronunciations are not clear?
        Some of the audios are using old version, so they are not really clear.

        Reply

        1. He means overall he cannot process the language yet. Not that your pronunciations are unclear.

          Jan, it takes time to develop your ‘ear’ in a new language. Everything sounds foreign and it is hard to differentiate the sounds even. But! Over time the sounds will become more and more familiar to you and you will be able to hear them better. Start with learning the tones. Practice speaking daily. Go from there. Good luck.

          Reply

          2. this might be the most pretentious shit I’ve ever seen. He’s saying the audio quality is bad. Listen to it yourself jackass.

    2. contrariwise rusty, for me it’s no problem without the english. it’s just 100 characters, and if you study chinese for a month or two, you’ll know them all. furthermore, even if there was an english translation, this translation would still be useless to you. you might get a good feeling from it, but you wouldn’t be able to go anywhere with that.

      i think min min did a great job with providing the tonemarks (and stealing the audio, but this is chinese style 😉

      Reply

      1. Hi Alfons,
        The audio before Jan 2010 is has low quality. I will find time to update those low quality audio.
        Thanks for visiting my website.

        Reply

  2. Nice work, appreciate that.. By the way, we foreigners generally strugle against the words like ” 从” or ” 草 ” . The initial “c” which is followed by “o” “e” “a” is really hard to pronounce.

    Could you please give some examples about that. Thanks in advance..

    Reply

    1. Hi ömer,
      Thanks.
      I think you are learning Pinyin. Chinese pronunciation is different from English.
      I am preparing a Pinyin ebook. I hope that would be useful for you.
      Stay tuned and get updated. 谢谢。

      Reply

    2. “struggle against” …an amusing use of words in the Chinese context. THanks for the site Min Min. It is very useful.

      Reply

  3. Hallo Min Min..
    im really2 happy when i found your website. I’ve try to search chinese-learning site for a year…this is great! Keep ur good job. I want to make request, can you please suggest or upload a chinese song video with pinyin and english meaning? Im so happy if u can do that…Thanks a lot.

    Reply

  4. Hello Min Min,
    I’m Sri Lankan girl. I have a friend in China. Some times when we talk he doesn’t know the meaning. It’s very difficult to us. So I thought to learn Chinese. Then I found this site. It’s very useful. Thank you very much. This is GREAT.

    Most of the times I need simple sentence to talk with others in our daily work. I appreciate if you can arrange some thing helping for this purpose.

    Reply

    1. Hi Chris,
      For these 100 most popular characters, I do not include traditional characters and the meaning. I think I will spend some time to update this post to add more info.

      Thanks.

      Reply

  8. I m Aneeiy from Bangladesh. I love Chinese Language. I know some Chinese Phrases. But i don’t know how to write this. Now i want to know, How many Useful Chinese character use in this language. Is it possible to learn for me?

    Reply

    1. Hi Aneeiy,
      From the statistics as mentioned above, in order for you understand basic Chinese language, you have to learn about 900 Chinese characters and 11,000 phrases/words.

      I believe if you have the will, you will be able to pick up Chinese very fast. 🙂
      加油！

      Reply

      1. Hi Min,

        Can you please explain what is the difference between Chinese Characters (900) and Chinese Phrases/words (11,000).

        If i need to learn Basic Chinese , do i need to start from Characters?

        Reply

        1. Hi Nathan,
          Character means 字, is a single word. A character may have or may not have meaning.
          eg: 我，大，们
          Word can be a single character or formed by multiple characters. A word has meaning.
          eg: 我，我们，大，大家
          You can start by learning most common Chinese words.

          Reply

  10. Hi 敏敏,

    Its a nice site, but not of much use to me.
    I will tell you why
    I really like start learning with traditional first. I find them more meaningful and romantic.
    I somehow feel uncomfortable with its cripple version. I feel like seeing an animal without its limbs. Sorry to put in that way.
    Would it be possible for you to add another column next to the character with a traditional Character, i think that there is a space. Please keep the simplified version it is still useful for some people.

    thank you
    well here it is in case you will help me with my request
    的一是不了在人有我他這個們中來上大為和國地到以說時要就出會可也你對生能而子那得於著下自之年過發後作裡用道行所然家種事成方多經麼去法學如都同現當沒動面起看定天分還進好小部其些主樣理心她本前開但因只從想實

    Reply

    1. Hi infinity,
      Thanks for your suggestion. I will try to update this post once I have time.
      谢谢。

      Reply

  11. Hi,

    I love this site…it’s really great for learning Chinese and my friend and I are trying to learn a few words every day…is there any way that you can post a link showing all of the words that have been posted over the last few years??

    Thanks so much for all of your hard work!!

    Reply

  12. Hi,
    I was wondering if these characters were Traditional Chinese or Simplified. Could you please explain me the difference? I have problem distinguishing between them?

    Reply

  15. Hey Min Min, this really helpful, 非常感谢!
    I just have a single question, what exactly does the “usage” column stand for? Thanks again 🙂

    Rory

    Reply

      1. That “usage” explanaion is quite confusing. 的 -> 95.9… Is that a percentage? In this case, 95.9 % of what?

        Reply

  16. Hi Min Min!!! This is really nice… I wish that the characters above will have its English meaning written beside it…just like in the 101-200 chinese characters… 🙂 please publish 201-300. I wish to learn up to 500 more. I am diligently returning to your very useful and informative site everyday. Happy New Year!!! 😉

    Reply

  17. Min Min,

    This was incredibly helpful for me in how to prioritize what to review / learn in Chinese. Especially the source you based this ranked list on. Major props to you on the entire website, actually.

    By background, I grew up in the United States, and my parents taught me Chinese and put my in Chinese school from a young age, but without a regular outlet and way/will to practice, I let it slide a bit. My goal is to (re)learn the top 3,500 characters + those 11,000 phrases/words before I go to live and work in China in the next 3-6 months. (where it’ll hopefully be much easier to pick up slang / colloquialisms).

    I had a question – have you come across a resource which groups the most common 3,500 words (or at least the 现代汉语常用字表) use by radical? Or a tool that makes it possible to do so with a character list that you already have? I’m attempting to learn in different ways, and grouping characters differently to see which way it is best to learn by: how frequently used, similar meanings, similar pronunciation, similar radicals.

    Thanks!
    Fu

    Reply

      1. Thanks Min Min.

        This was helpful. I’m actually already using that resource, but by relooking at it I realized the way I’m doing it was inefficient and not that useful.

        What I’ll be doing is adding an additional column to that data set which includes the radical, so you can also look up / sort characters by radical. I’m utilizing the radical list from 新华字典, since I think that is one of the world’s currently most popular dictionaries (there are 189 radicals).

        If you want, I can send you the Excel backup since I think that’d be a really helpful resource.

        Cheers.

        Reply

  23. Hi Min Min,

    I’m just here to say thank you so much. I’m a part-time Chinese language teacher and this list is very useful for me to determine what to teach. Thank you again.

    Chengtao

    Reply

  24. gud work…pls add english meanings also(when time allows you)…as it was suggested earlier by someone else…it will be gr8 then..

    Reply
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  28. Qin ai de Min Min :
    wo hui shuo zhongwen yes hui xie pinyin danshi bu hui xie hanyu.
    qing jiao wo, zhenme xie hanyu?

    xiexie nin
    Momin

    Reply
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  32. Thank you so much! This is amazing! This exactly what I needed to prioritize the characters, which to learn first. I am almost done with this sheet and going to move on to 200 characters sheet. Thank you.

    Reply

    1. Hi Bob,
      Thanks for using my website to learn Chinese.
      Sorry to tell you that some of the animated Chinese characters images are missing due to some technical issues.
      Anyway, I am going to revisit those characters and recreate the images as well as the sounds.

      Reply

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