饥 meaning and stroke order
Hungry, starving; hunger, famine
How to write 饥, stroke by stroke
5 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 饥
Definitions from CC-CEDICT, grouped by pronunciation.
- (bound form) hungry
- variant of 飢|饥[ji1]
How 饥 is built
Phono-semantic (sound + meaning) character. Food.
饣 gives the meaning and 几 hints at the sound.
Radical: 饣 (food), shared by 43 characters on this site.
How to remember 饥
饥 combines the food radical 饣 with 几 (jǐ), which gives the sound jī. Picture a table with only a few (几) bits of food (饣) on it, and you are left hungry.
饥 is a bound form, so it rarely stands alone in speech. It appears in words like 饥饿 (jī'è) and 饥荒 (jīhuāng), and in daily talk people usually just say 饿 (è). Example: 我饥肠辘辘。(Wǒ jīchánglùlù.) My stomach is rumbling with hunger.
Common mistake: Learners often write 饥 with 机 (jī, machine) or 肌 (jī, muscle) in mind, since all three share 几 and the same sound. Check the left side: 饥 needs the food radical 饣, not 木 or 月.
Common words with 饥
Ordered by HSK level, then by how often they appear in everyday Chinese.
饥 in example sentences
Real sentences from the Tatoeba project, with pinyin and English.
Questions about 饥
How many strokes are in 饥?
饥 is written with 5 strokes. The diagrams on this page number every stroke in the order it is written, with the new stroke shown in red.
What does 饥 mean?
饥 (jī) means hungry, starving; hunger, famine. A common word with it is 饥饿 (jī'è), meaning "hunger; starvation".
How do you pronounce 饥?
饥 is pronounced jī, in the first tone (high and level).
What is the radical of 饥?
The radical of 饥 is 饣, which carries the idea of "food". Dictionaries list 饥 under this radical.
What is the traditional form of 饥?
The traditional form of 饥 is 飢 and 饑. Traditional characters are used in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau; 饥 is the simplified form used in mainland China and Singapore.
Is 饥 on the HSK exam?
Yes. 饥 is part of the HSK 7-9 character list in the HSK 3.0 standard.
What is the difference between 饥 and 饿?
饿 (è) is the everyday word for hungry, as in 我饿了 (wǒ è le). 饥 is more formal or literary and mostly appears inside compounds such as 饥饿 or idioms like 忍饥挨饿 (rěnjī-ái'è).
Can 饥渴 be used for things other than food?
Yes. Literally it means hungry and thirsty, but figuratively it describes craving something, such as knowledge or love. For example, 对知识的饥渴 (duì zhīshi de jīkě) means a thirst for knowledge.