Meaning of 水
Definitions from CC-CEDICT.
- water
- (after a name) ... River
- to swim (used mostly in 會水|会水[hui4 shui3] and 水性[shui3 xing4])
- (coll.) lacking in substance; shoddy
- (bound form) additional cost; extra income
- classifier for washings of a garment
- surname Shui
- Shui ethnic group
How to use 水
水 is one of the most common words in daily life, used alone for water and in many compounds like 水果 (shuǐguǒ, fruit) and 水平 (shuǐpíng, level). In speech it can also mean something is shoddy or lacking substance. Example: 我想喝水。(Wǒ xiǎng hē shuǐ.) I want to drink some water.
水 (shuǐ) looks like a stream: a long central line with splashes flowing off to both sides. Picture water running down the middle and spraying left and right.
Common mistake: Learners often confuse 水 with 永 (yǒng, forever), which has an extra dot on top, or with 冰 (bīng, ice), which adds two dots on the left. Also keep the third tone in shuǐ and do not flatten it to shuī.
水 in example sentences
Real sentences from the Tatoeba project, with pinyin and English.
Stroke order for each character
Open a character for its meaning, components and more words.
水 shuǐ · water · 4 strokes
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
Related words
Words that share a character with 水.
| 水果 | shuǐguǒ | fruit |
| 水平 | shuǐpíng | horizontal; level; a standard; a level (of ability, development etc) |
| 药水 | yàoshuǐ | medicine in liquid form; bottled medicine |
| 凉水 | liángshuǐ | cool water; unboiled water |
| 海水 | hǎishuǐ | seawater |
| 汽水 | qìshuǐ | soda pop; carbonated soft drink |
| 泪水 | lèishuǐ | teardrop; tears |
| 矿泉水 | kuàngquánshuǐ | mineral water |
| 开水 | kāishuǐ | boiled water; boiling water |
| 纯净水 | chúnjìngshuǐ | purified water |
| 雨水 | yǔshuǐ | rainwater; rainfall; rain |
| 水分 | shuǐfèn | moisture content; (fig.) overstatement; padding |
Questions about 水
What does 水 mean?
水 (shuǐ) means "water; (after a name) ... River" and is used as a noun.
How do you write 水?
水 is made of 1 character: 水 (4 strokes). That is 4 strokes in total.
Is 水 an HSK word?
Yes. 水 is on the HSK 1 vocabulary list of the HSK 3.0 standard.
How do I ask for cold or plain water in a Chinese restaurant?
Say 凉水 (liángshuǐ) for cool water, or 冰水 (bīngshuǐ) for ice water. Hot water is 热水 (rèshuǐ), and many places serve it by default.
What does 水 mean when someone says a class or product is 很水?
In casual speech, 很水 (hěn shuǐ) means something is low quality or has little real content, like a weak lecture or a shoddy product. It is informal and slightly critical.