Lookup of the 214 Kangxi radicals. Search by radical, pinyin or meaning, or browse by stroke count. Each radical has its reading, meaning and example characters, checked against Unicode's Han database.
Kangxi Radical Lookup (214 部首查询)
How to use
Search by radical, pinyin or meaning
Type the radical itself (木), its pinyin (mu), an English meaning (water) or an example character.
Read the row
Each row gives the radical, its stroke count, reading, meaning and a few example characters. Every example is a character Unicode's Han database files under that radical.
Browse by strokes
The full list below is grouped by stroke count, from 1 to 17. Side forms such as 氵, 扌 and 艹, and mainland simplified forms, sit in it at their modern stroke counts.
Switch script
The Traditional Chinese page shows the traditional table: no simplified radical forms, and traditional example characters.
The 214 Kangxi radicals, and what simplification changed
A radical is the component a dictionary files a character under. The Kangxi Dictionary, completed in 1716, filed characters under 214 radicals and ordered them by stroke count: 6 radicals of one stroke, 23 of two, 31 of three, 34 of four, 23 of five, and so on up to 龠 at seventeen. Unicode's Kangxi Radicals block numbers them 1 to 214 in the same order.
Radicals often hint at meaning, but not always
Characters with 氵 are often about water (江, 河, 海) and those with 扌 about the hand (打, 抓, 握). But a radical is a filing decision, not a promise of meaning: 行 is radical 144 in its own right, not a character under 彳.
Simplification changed some radicals
Unicode's radical data lists 32 simplified radical forms, such as 讠 for 言, 钅 for 金, 饣 for 食 and 车 for 車. Some characters changed radical along the way: 聞 is filed under 耳, but its simplified form 闻 under 门. That is why this tool keeps two tables, one for each script.
How the examples are chosen
Examples come from the radical index of Unicode's Han database (Unihan, kRSUnicode). The simplified table takes characters in GB 2312, most frequent first; the traditional table takes characters in Big5, those taught earliest in Hong Kong primary schools first. A few radicals have no other character in either set, and show none.
Grass, mouth and water head the most characters
Of the 102,999 characters Unicode's Han database assigns a radical, the largest radicals are 艸 (grass) with 4,128, 口 (mouth) 3,976, 水 (water) 3,927, 木 (tree) 3,516 and 手 (hand) 2,909.
The smallest is radical 95, 玄, with just 14 characters.
By stroke count the 214 run 6, 23, 31, 34, 23, 29 and 20 for one to seven strokes; the other 48 have eight to seventeen.
禸 is radical 114 and sits among the five-stroke radicals, though modern counting gives it four strokes — one place where the Kangxi count and the modern count differ.
行 is not a character under 彳: it is radical 144 in its own right.
阝 on the left is radical 170, 阜 (as in 阳 and 陈); on the right it is radical 163, 邑 (as in 都 and 邻).
Unicode's radical data lists 32 simplified radical forms, among them 讠, 钅, 饣, 车 and 门.
Simplification can move a character to another radical: 聞 is filed under 耳 but 闻 under 门, and 轟 is three 車 while 轰 is 车 plus 双.
一 is radical 1, a single stroke, and Unicode files 326 characters under it.
The last radical, 龠 (yuè, an ancient pipe), has seventeen strokes, the most of any.
Frequently Asked Questions
The component a dictionary files a character under. A character can have several components but is filed under one radical in a given dictionary.
It is the set the Kangxi Dictionary (1716) used, and Unicode numbers its Kangxi Radicals block 1 to 214 in the same order. Modern dictionaries have their own radical lists, which need not match.
The 214 follow the Kangxi grouping — 玉, 田 and 目 are five strokes, 竹 and 米 six. Side forms such as 氵 and 扌 use the modern count (氵 is three).
It depends on the side: on the left it is 阜, radical 170; on the right 邑, radical 163.
Mostly. Unicode lists 32 simplified radical forms (讠, 钅, 饣, 车, 门 and others), and a few characters changed radical when simplified, such as 聞 (耳) and 闻 (门).
Unicode's Han database (Unihan) records each character's radical (kRSUnicode). We list only characters filed under the row's radical — GB 2312 characters in the simplified table, Big5 characters in the traditional one.
Those radicals have no other character in GB 2312 or Big5 — 支, 牙 and 高 in the simplified table, for example. An empty cell is better than a character filed under the wrong radical.
Yes. Each radical's number and stroke count, and the radical of every example, are checked automatically against Unicode 18.0's radical data and Unihan. The October 2026 check corrected 13 radicals in the wrong stroke group, 8 radicals in the traditional table that had been converted into other characters, and 53 examples filed under the wrong radical.
Method & sources
How it computes
Reference table in RadicalKernel: the 214 Kangxi radicals in Unicode's order (CJKRadicals.txt) with Kangxi's stroke grouping, plus side forms and mainland simplified forms. Examples are characters Unihan (kRSUnicode) files under each radical: GB 2312 by kHanyuPinlu frequency for the simplified table, Big5 by Hong Kong school grade for the traditional. Tested against a Unihan fixture.
What this tool implements
- Data checked against Unicode 18.0 for the first time and rebuilt: 13 radicals sat in the wrong stroke group (玉 田 目 石 示 禾 竹 米 糸 网 羊 耳 肉); in the Traditional table 儿 几 尸 干 幺 广 网 虫 had been converted into 兒 幾 屍 幹 么 廣 網 蟲 and five phantom rows (車 門 馬 鳥 魚 at simplified stroke counts) added; 53 examples were filed under another radical (行 under 彳); 130 rows had no examples and now do.
- Corrected: meanings taken from the wrong dictionary sense (比 'Belgium', 水 'Shui ethnic group', 金 'Jurchen Jin dynasty'); pinyin of 比, 舌, 纟. Removed as unsourced: 'every Chinese dictionary uses 214', '50-80 radicals cover 80% of characters', '50-70% fewer strokes', 49,030 characters, the 轰 three-carts quote (that is 轟), and a data-source credit to the Modern Chinese Dictionary.
Sources
- Unicode Consortium. Unicode Character Database 18.0, CJKRadicals.txt: Kangxi radical number to unified ideograph, and 32 simplified radical forms. https://www.unicode.org/Public/UCD/latest/ucd/CJKRadicals.txt
- Unicode Consortium. Unihan database (UAX #38), Unicode 18.0: kRSUnicode, kTotalStrokes, kDefinition, kMandarin, kHanyuPinlu, kGradeLevel, kBigFive, kGB0. https://www.unicode.org/Public/UCD/latest/ucd/Unihan.zip
- Unicode Consortium. Kangxi Radicals code chart, U+2F00-U+2FDF. https://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U2F00.pdf
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