A radical (bùshǒu, 部首) is a key component of Chinese characters used to categorize them in dictionaries. Each character is assigned one radical, which often hints at its meaning. The Kangxi dictionary system defines 214 standard radicals, which remain the foundation for character lookup today.

The traditional Kangxi system has 214 radicals, grouped by stroke count from 1 to 17. Simplified Chinese systems may use around 187–227 radicals depending on the standard. This tool includes the most frequently encountered radicals that learners will come across in daily study.

A radical is the specific component used to index a character in a dictionary—each character has only one official radical. A component (偏旁, piānpáng) is any building block within a character. For example, 好 contains the components 女 and 子, but its official radical is 女. All radicals are components, but not all components are radicals.

Many radicals change shape when used as a side component to fit better within the character's structure. Common examples: 人 → 亻(on the left), 水 → 氵(three-dot water), 手 → 扌(hand radical), 心 → 忄(vertical heart), 火 → 灬(four-dot fire at the bottom), and 刀 → 刂(knife on the right). Recognizing these variants is essential for fluent character reading.

Start by identifying the likely semantic component—often on the left, top, or surrounding the character. If unsure, look at the most visually prominent part. Use this tool by typing the character into the search bar, and it will locate the radical for you. For characters not yet in our database, browsing radicals by stroke count is a reliable fallback method.

Start with high-frequency semantic radicals: 口(mouth), 亻/人(person), 氵/水(water), 木(tree/wood), 扌/手(hand), 女(woman), 火(fire), 土(earth), 艹(grass/plant), 讠/言(speech), 心(heart), 月(meat/moon), 日(sun), 石(stone), and 王(jade). Mastering these 15 radicals will help you understand the meaning clues in hundreds of common characters.

Often, but not always. In phono-semantic compounds (形声字)—which make up about 80% of Chinese characters—the radical typically provides a meaning clue while another component hints at pronunciation. For example, in 清(qīng, clear), 氵(water) gives the meaning and 青(qīng) gives the sound. However, some radicals were assigned historically for dictionary lookup purposes and may not reflect the character's meaning perfectly.

No! While many common radicals appear on the left (氵, 亻, 扌, 口, 女, 木), radicals can appear in various positions: on top (艹, ⺮, 宀, 雨), on the bottom (心, 灬, 皿), on the right (刂, 阝, 力, 攵), or surrounding the character (囗, 门, 广, 辶). Learning to spot radicals in all positions is a key reading skill.

Officially, no—each character is assigned a single radical for dictionary indexing. However, a character may contain multiple components that are themselves radicals. For example, 想 contains both 木 and 心 as components, but its official radical is 心. Different dictionaries may occasionally disagree on a character's radical assignment, but the Kangxi standard is widely accepted.

This Radical Finder helps you: (1) quickly identify the radical of any common character by searching, (2) browse radicals by stroke count to familiarize yourself with the system, (3) discover characters that share the same radical—revealing meaning patterns, and (4) understand variant forms that appear in actual characters. Regular use builds the pattern recognition skills essential for mastering Chinese characters efficiently.