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:

林

Phonetic Root (声旁 / Sound Core)HSK 4

林 (lín)

woods; grove; forest; circle of people; surname Lin

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Family Characters

HSK Words

Tone Fan-out (林)

How this root's pronunciation drifts across the Mandarin tone spectrum:

2 Active Tones

Tone 1jīn

Tone 2lín

Family Characters (10)

Root: 林

林

lín

HSK 4

Phonetic Root (声旁 / Sound Core)

woods; grove; forest; circle of people; surname Lin

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禁

jīn

HSK 4

示(spirit)

to endure

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婪

lán

HSK 7

女(woman)

old variant of 婪[lan2]

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彬

bīn

HSK 7

彡(hair)

urbane; well-bred; cultivated

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淋

lín

HSK 7

氵(water)

to sprinkle, to drench

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啉

lín

Expansion

口(mouth)

used in the transliteration of the names of organic compounds such as porphyrin 卟啉[bu3 lin2] and quinoline 喹啉[kui2 lin2]

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琳

lín

Expansion

王(jade)

gem

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痲

má

Expansion

疒(sickness)

leprosy; numb

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郴

chēn

Expansion

阝(city)

name of a district in Hunan

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霖

lín

Expansion

雨(rain)

continued rain

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