轍 meaning and stroke order
Track, rut; stuck in a rut
How to write 轍, stroke by stroke
19 strokes in order. Each box adds the next stroke in red. Write top to bottom and left to right, and finish enclosing strokes last.
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Meaning of 轍
Definitions from CC-CEDICT, grouped by pronunciation.
- rut; track of a wheel (Taiwan pr. [che4])
- (coll.) the direction of traffic
- a rhyme (of a song, poem etc)
- (dialect) (usu. after 有[you3] or 沒|没[mei2]) way; idea
How 轍 is built
Phono-semantic (sound + meaning) character. Cart.
車 gives the meaning and 徹 hints at the sound.
Radical: 車 (cart), shared by 49 characters on this site.
How to remember 轍
轍 (zhé) puts a cart 車 on the left, which tells you the meaning: the track a cart wheel leaves behind. The rest of the character comes from 徹 (chè), which hints at the sound. You can picture a wheel rolling all the way through (徹) the mud and leaving a rut.
On its own 轍 means a wheel track, but you will mostly meet it in set words. 沒轍 (méizhé) is very common in speech for having no way out. Idioms like 重蹈覆轍 and 如出一轍 use the image of cart tracks. Example: 我真的沒轍了。(Wǒ zhēn de méizhé le.) I'm really out of ideas.
Common mistake: Learners often mix up 轍 with 徹 (chè, thorough) and 撤 (chè, withdraw), which share the same right side. Only 轍 has 車 on the left, and it is read zhé in mainland Mandarin, not chè.
Common words with 轍
Ordered by HSK level, then by how often they appear in everyday Chinese.
Questions about 轍
How many strokes are in 轍?
轍 is written with 19 strokes. The diagrams on this page number every stroke in the order it is written, with the new stroke shown in red.
What does 轍 mean?
轍 (zhé) means track, rut; stuck in a rut. A common word with it is 没辙 (méizhé), meaning "at one's wit's end; unable to find a way out".
How do you pronounce 轍?
轍 is pronounced zhé, in the second tone (rising).
What is the radical of 轍?
The radical of 轍 is 車, which carries the idea of "cart". Dictionaries list 轍 under this radical.
What is the simplified form of 轍?
轍 is a traditional character. Its simplified form is 辙, used in mainland China and Singapore.
What does 有轍 mean compared with 沒轍?
In colloquial and dialect speech, 轍 can mean a way or an idea. 有轍 (yǒuzhé) means you have a way to handle something, and 沒轍 (méizhé) means you have none.
Why does 轍 relate to rhymes?
In traditional Chinese song and opera, 轍 can refer to a rhyme category, as in 十三轍 (shísān zhé), the thirteen rhyme groups. The idea is that lines follow the same track of sound.