Phonetic Families & Components
Sound Roots & Semantic Radicals Explorer
Decode Chinese characters by their shared sound roots and see how semantic radicals split their meanings across tones.
Popular Roots:
严
Phonetic Root (声旁 / Sound Core)HSK 4
严 (yán)
strict, stern, rigorous, tight, severe
2
Family Characters
1
HSK Words
Tone Fan-out (严)
How this root's pronunciation drifts across the Mandarin tone spectrum:
2 Active Tones
Tone 2yán
Tone 3yǎn
Family Characters (2)
Root: 严严
yán
HSK 4Phonetic Root (声旁 / Sound Core)
strict, stern, rigorous, tight, severe