咖 (kā) - Meaning, Stroke Order & Audio

咖

kā[ka1]Tone 1

coffee

HSK 3

Multiple Readings (多音字):

Guru Deep Dive

English · coffee

Cached lesson

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Topology:Left-right

Strokes:8

Writing Balance Rule: The left radical (口) takes up about one-third of the horizontal space, leaving two-thirds for the right phonetic component (加). Keep the vertical strokes balanced and centered.

1. Meaning

coffee

gradeclass (used in slang/loanwords)

Noun / Bound FormColloquial / ModernBound morpheme#food and drink#loanwords

Sample Usage

我每天早上都要喝咖啡。
wǒ měitiān zǎoshang dōuyào hē kāfēi.
I drink coffee every morning.
大咖
dàkā
Big shot / VIP / superstar

2. Sound

/[kʰä˥˥]/Tone: 55

咖

kāka1

¯(55)

=kā

Initial Consonant

Type: Aspirated Velar

Sounds like: k sound as in 'key' or 'cat'

Aspirated

Airflow Tactile Test: Strong gust of air from throat! Tissue held in front MUST fly forward.

Tongue & Mouth Position: Back of the tongue raises to touch the soft palate, then releases with a strong burst of air.

Final Rhyme

Vowel Group: -a vowel group

Sounds like: -a rhymes with 'ah' or the 'a' in 'father'

Mouth Shape Guide: Pronounce as standalone vowel 'ah'.

Common Learner Trap: Keep vowel quality steady across all 4 tone contours.

Tone

T1 (55)

5 → 5 (55)

1st Tone (High-Flat)

Tone Pitch & Cadence: Tone 1 is a high, steady pitch with no rise or fall, matching the sustained 'high note' of a singer.

👂

Listening trap: Confusing it with Tone 4 (kà) or mistaking the unvoiced initial for a voiced 'g'.

👋

Physical Tone Gesture: A high, flat line drawn level across the top of your vision, like an airplane cruising at high altitude.

3. Writing

Topology: Left-right · Strokes: 8 strokes

4. Components

Radical 口 · Mouth Radical (Mouth, speaking, eating, or drinking)

Semantic Clue (形旁): 口 (Indicates that the character represents something consumed by mouth or is a phonetic loanword.)

Phonetic Clue (声旁): 加 (original sound: jiā / kā)

The mouth radical (口) is placed on the left to show that coffee is a drink taken through the mouth, combined with the phonetic component 'add' (加) on the right to approximate the foreign sound 'ka'.

口 Mouth / consumption indicator
加 Phonetic clue for 'ka'

Phonetic Family (形声字家族)

15· Phonetic Root: 加 (jiā)

5. History

Liushu category: Phono-semantic (形声)

Origin: This is a modern phonetic loan character created in the 19th or 20th century to transliterate foreign loanwords starting with 'ka', most notably 'coffee' (咖啡 kāfēi).

Semantic Evolution: Originally invented purely for its sound to transcribe foreign words, it has expanded in modern slang to also mean 'grade', 'rank', or 'big shot' (e.g., 大咖 dàkā, derived from the English word 'class').

Loan characters (译音字) like 咖 are essential in modern Chinese for transliterating foreign terminology.

6. Sinosphere

🇯🇵

Kanji (Japanese)

On: カ

Sound Shift Bridge: Matches the international syllable sound 'ka' found in numerous modern loanwords across languages.

7. Memory

Vivid Mnemonic Story

You open your MOUTH (口) to ADD (加) hot water and roasted beans, creating aromatic COFFEE (咖).

Phonetic Family (形声字家族)

加

jiāto add / plusUses the exact same right-side component without the mouth radical.

架

jiàframe / rackReplaces the mouth with wood (木) underneath.

驾

jiàto drive / rideIncludes the horse (马) component at the bottom.

Lookalikes & Traps (形近字)

加(jiā)

加 lacks the mouth radical (口) on the left and means 'to add'.

咖啡(kāfēi)

咖 is almost always seen paired with 啡 to form the complete word for coffee (咖啡).

8. Mastery

Active Recall Challenge

我每天早上都要喝[___]。

Clue: kā fēi

Common Learner Pitfall

Attempting to use '咖' as a standalone word; in standard Mandarin, it is almost exclusively bound inside the compound word 咖啡 or slang terms like 大咖.

Memory Prompts

Recognition: When you see '咖' combined with '啡', what does it mean and how is it pronounced?

Production: How do you write the character for 'ka' used in the word for coffee?

咖kācoffee

Speed:

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