Character: 苹 (píng) apple

苹 (píng) means apple, the character is visualized as an upside lying down apple on the ground under two plants

An upside down apple

Pinyin píng
Meaning apple; duckweed
Radical 艹（艸） 繁體字 蘋
Two writing patterns can be found in the character 苹 (píng) apple: 丷, highlighted in red; and 十, highlighted in yellow 丷
十

writing patterns, not components

Chinese character phono-semantic compoundcategory: phono-semantic compound

Chinese character up down structurestructure: up down

8stroke count

HSK 1

Stroke order of the Chinese character 苹 (píng) apple. There are 8 strokes, and the character is written from top to bottom

Breakdown

The original meaning of 苹 (píng) is “duckweed.” It is a phono-semantic compound character that consists of the radical 艹 “grass,” indicating a kind of plant, and the phonetic component 平 (píng) “flat.” Today, 苹 (píng) mainly means “apple.”

píng
苹
apple		 艹
grass		 cǎo
草
grass		 huā
花
flower
píng
平
flat		 píng
评
to discuss		 pìng
秤
weighing scale

Used as a morpheme/word

苹 (píng) “apple” is mostly used as a morpheme.

Wordlist

How to pronounce

This character sounds like the letter p ending with an ng sound.

2nd Pinyin Yale IPA
Initial p- p [pʰ]
Final -ing ing [iŋ]

Chinese character practice sheet

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