help bg

Keats Blog

Keats Blog offers great information about Chinese language learning, Chinese culture, Mandarin Chinese, and information about China.
Go Back

The 500 Most Commonly Used Chinese Characters

If you are a beginner in the Chinese language or plan to start to learn Mandarin, you must know the 500 most commonly used Chinese characters. These words can help you lay a solid foundation for your further Mandarin study and facilitate your learning progress.

These 500 most commonly used Chinese characters reflect the basic rules of Chinese character formation. That’s because there are rules in the formation of Chinese characters.

Chinese characters mostly consist of basic characters plus radicals, parts, and strokes to form new characters. No matter how complex the shape of Chinese characters is, there is always a basic character and components.

Therefore, once you have learned the basic Chinese characters that are most commonly used, you could know more Chinese characters by adding radicals, parts, and strokes, and boosts your learning of the new Chinese characters.

And memorizing Chinese vocabulary would be your new mission for the next level of learning; you could get some inspiration from the article about the best resources to learn Chinese vocabulary.

To help you better learn and master these commonly used Chinese characters, we have listed out some useful tips for your reference:

TIP 1: Insist on learning every day.

Learn a few Chinese characters each time. Through continuous learning and input, you could gradually accumulate the literacy of Chinese characters.

When you start learning, you can choose those Chinese characters you are interested in to learn. Interest is the best teacher.

At the same time, the learning task for a Mandarin beginner is to lay a solid foundation and read. Therefore, the most basic criterion for learning these 500 Chinese characters is to recognize and read again.

Reading this article about HOW TO LEARN CHINESE IN 5 MINUTES can help you make your learning efficient.

TIP 2:Recognize first and write later.

Chinese characters’ structural relationships and morphological characteristics are relatively obvious and easy to read, but writing is more difficult for Mandarin learners. You can first spend more attention to learn how to perceive the shape, understand the meaning of the word, remember the sound, and reduce the writing requirements. Recognize first and write later; recognize more and write less.

TIP 3: Stroke decomposition

Correctly decompose Chinese characters into strokes, especially composite strokes, such as “horizontal, skew, curved hook,” “horizontal fold, folded hook,” and other complex strokes, which help write Chinese characters and are also helpful for searching Chinese characters.

TIP 4: Stroke order

Choose Chinese characters that are easy to be written in the wrong stroke order for practice. For example, words such as “与、车、火、出、脊、登、考、皮、讯、管、凹、凸” are easy to be written in wrong stroke order.

TIP 5: Flashcard

There are various flashcards on the market, and you can also make them yourself. It is best to use a card with Chinese characters on the front and pinyin and paraphrase on the back (or pictures). There are many ways to use literacy cards, such as looking at Chinese characters, guessing the pronunciation, meanings, and connecting words. This method is not only suitable for self-study but also convenient for two people to practice together.

TIP 6: By increasing or decreasing strokes

Select several Chinese characters and learn new characters by adding or subtracting strokes to form new characters.

TIP 7: Use Radicals to form new words

Choose a radical, such as “扌,” or the pronunciation “Ling,” and try to recall as many Chinese characters as possible.

TIP 8: Avoid typos.

For Mandarin beginners, pictophonetic characters are often confused. After adding radicals, the literal meaning of the original character will change differently, and guessing the general meaning of the literal will often make a mistake. To avoid typos, you can increase the Chinese character reserve by increasing the amount of reading.

TIP 9: Learning whenever you can

The place to learn Chinese characters is not limited to schools. As long as you have conditions, you should use the pocket of time to learn as many Chinese characters as possible. For example, often look through the dictionary, watch Chinese character programs on TV,  try the self-test questions on Chinese characters published in newspapers and magazines, etc.

Chinese characters are highly adaptable and have strong word-building capabilities. The same Chinese character has different meaning changes and functions in different word formations and in different sentences. After mastering this rule of Chinese character formation, you can make your Chinese character learning scientific and systematic. It can also improve the speed and quality of Chinese character learning.

After mastering these 500 most commonly used Chinese characters, learning another 3000 Chinese characters will become very easy!

 

Below is the most commonly used Chinese Characters:

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

            使              

                          

                          

                     西     

                          

                          

            便              

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

                          

Related Articles

Which Chinese Language Program
is right for you?

PROGRAMS

Rients's Story at Keats Kunming, My Second Hometown

OVER 7300+ STUDENTS HAVE STUDIED AT KEATS

Joep

Joep | Netherlands

Intensive One-on-One Chinese Classes

I have been to Keats School to learn Chinese for 4 times now. The reason for coming back to this school is pretty much that the teachers I did work with were very good Chinese teachers. I make it a 5-year plan or even a 10-year plan to come back to this school.  All the teachers have methods of looking at what your skills are. They are aware of at what level you are. I think it is worth for everyone.

Aliza

Aliza | USA

Intensive One-on-One Chinese Classes

I found Keats School and I am so glad that I did. When you learn Chinese in China at Keats, you are fully being taken care of. My teacher is really great and we become lovely friends.

Sarah

Sarah | USA

Intensive One-on-One Chinese Classes

My name is Sarah Fish. I am 81. I knew very little Chinese when I arrived. How was I going to survive 2 weeks of intensive Chinese course? I have to laugh when I think of that now. What a positive experience this has been! I really wish we could be here a little longer. The teachers are extremely encouraging, evaluating first how much someone knows, and then starting from there.

Judith

Judith | USA

Intensive One-on-One Chinese Classes

Listening and speaking in the classroom every day has improved my communication skills. After three weeks, my new words and sentences became more and more natural and fluent. Now I am used to thinking in Chinese, and I understand better what other people say, to be able to have real conversations with other people.

Liam

Liam | UK

HSK Test Preparation Course

Last year I started studying Chinese at University. The reason that I came here is that currently, I’m preparing for the HSK 5 test. Also, I heard that this is one of the best schools to study Mandarin in China. After I came here I realized that Kunming is a pretty cool city to live in and with regards to the teachers’ teaching methods, I think they’re very professional. And I think the language environment is good so now I’m ready to take the HSK 5.

Claudia

Claudia | Australia

Intensive One-on-One Chinese Classes

I’ve been at Keats school and Kunming now for one month doing the one-on-one Chinese lessons with two different teachers. I really enjoy it. Both of my teachers are very friendly and patient. They really helped me to improve my Chinese, both of my reading and speaking. I really enjoy studying Chinese in Kunming as well. This city is really beautiful and the weather is nice, the air is clean. It’s one of the best cities in China to study Chinese.

Josephine

Josephine | Indonesia

Intensive One-on-One Chinese Classes

I think Keats is one of the best language schools I have ever been to. My teacher is such an amazing person. She is so good at teaching. She makes classes fun. I have learned a lot of vocabulary during my time here. I would really recommend coming to learn Mandarin Chinese at Keats School.

Kim

Kim | UK

Intensive One-on-One Chinese Classes

I’ve had an amazing time at Keats. I am amazed at how much I’ve learned over the last 3 weeks and I will be really sad to go. We are already planning on our next trip of coming back because we had such a fantastic time here. They really tailor the Chinese language course to you and your individual needs.

Please use vertical scrolling on your mobile device.