Chinese characters → Zhuyin / Bopomofo (ㄅㄆㄇㄈ) converter, with each character's Zhuyin and a pinyin row. Readings follow a mainland library; check Taiwan school readings in the Ministry of Education's dictionary.
Zhuyin / Bopomofo Converter (注音符号)
Readings come from pinyin-pro, a library built around mainland Putonghua. Against the Ministry of Education's 《國語小字典》 it differed on about 1 character in 30 (measured 2 Oct 2026). Check the dictionary before using the output for Taiwan schoolwork or teaching material.
How to use
Paste Chinese text
Simplified or Traditional; words, sentences or paragraphs. English, numbers and punctuation are left as they are.
Read the Zhuyin
One syllable per character. Tones two to four follow the syllable; the neutral-tone dot ˙ comes first.
Character by character
Each character with its Zhuyin above it. The pinyin row uses the same readings.
Copy, then check
Before using it for Taiwan schoolwork or teaching material, check the readings in the Ministry of Education's 《國語小字典》. How often they differ is below.
Zhuyin, and where this converter's readings come from
Zhuyin Fuhao (注音符號, ㄅㄆㄇㄈ, formally "Mandarin Phonetic Symbols I") is the phonetic script Taiwan's primary schools teach. A Ministry of Education conference on unifying pronunciation (讀音統一會) drew up 39 letters in Beijing in February 1913; the ministry promulgated them in November 1918; they were renamed from 注音字母 to 注音符號 in April 1930; and when the ministry announced Mandarin Phonetic Symbols II in January 1986, the original letters became "Symbols I". Mandarin today uses 37 symbols, 21 initials and 16 finals, plus tone marks.
Tones two to four (ˊ ˇ ˋ) go at the top right of the syllable's last symbol. The first-tone bar ˉ is normally left out. The neutral-tone dot ˙ goes in front of the syllable in horizontal writing and above it in vertical writing (Ministry of Education, 《國語注音符號手冊》).
Where the readings come from
Turning a syllable into Zhuyin is mechanical. Turning a character into Zhuyin first means choosing its reading, and that is where software goes wrong. This page takes its readings from pinyin-pro, an open-source library built around mainland Putonghua and Simplified characters. So that Traditional text can find whole words too, each run of characters is converted to Simplified with OpenCC before the library reads it. The characters on screen are always the ones you typed.
On 2 October 2026 we ran it over the definitions in the Ministry of Education's children's dictionary 《國語小字典》, which prints Zhuyin beside every character. It differed from the ministry on about 1 character in 30 (before this change, 1 in 19), and about 1 in 7 of its short example phrases (four characters or more) had at least one syllable that differed.
The differences are of three kinds. Some words have a mainland reading and a different Taiwan school reading: for 星期 this page writes ㄒㄧㄥ ㄑㄧ where the 小字典 has ㄒㄧㄥ ㄑㄧˊ, and for 垃圾 ㄌㄚ ㄐㄧ where it has ㄌㄜˋ ㄙㄜˋ. Many such readings are listed as alternatives in the ministry's larger 《重編國語辭典修訂本》, so they are not simply wrong, but they are not what Taiwan's pupils are taught. Others are where to mark the neutral tone, which depends on meaning (東西 meaning "thing" is ㄉㄨㄥ ˙ㄒㄧ), and which reading of a character with several is meant.
For Taiwan schoolwork or a children's book, treat the output as a draft and check it in those two dictionaries. The ministry's own 中文譯音轉換系統 says that when more than one character is entered, its result is for reference only.
Zhuyin and pinyin
(1) Pinyin uses Latin letters (bā = ㄅㄚ); Zhuyin uses its own symbols, which the ministry's handbook describes as simplified forms of ancient characters chosen for their initial and rhyme sounds. (2) Taiwan's principles for romanising Chinese (中文譯音使用原則), as revised with the Executive Yuan's note of 18 December 2008 and issued by the ministry on 5 January 2009, make Hanyu Pinyin the standard unless another rule applies. That changed how Chinese is spelled in Latin letters, not how pupils learn Zhuyin. (3) The same principles say overseas Chinese teaching that uses a romanisation should use Hanyu Pinyin, unless it uses Zhuyin.
This tool's uses
(1) Adding Zhuyin to Chinese text for reading practice, with each character's Zhuyin beside it. (2) Comparing Zhuyin and pinyin for the same reading. To convert a syllable you already know (ni3 ↔ ㄋㄧˇ), use the Pinyin ↔ Zhuyin converter, where no reading has to be chosen.
Zhuyin from the 1913 pronunciation conference to Unicode
A Ministry of Education conference on unifying pronunciation met in Beijing in February 1913 and drew up 39 letters. The ministry promulgated them in November 1918.
The Ministry of Education's Zhuyin handbook says the symbols were made by simplifying ancient characters chosen for their initial and rhyme sounds (雙聲疊韻).
ㄅㄆㄇㄈ are the first four symbols in the table, and the English name "bopomofo" is those four sounds run together.
Taiwan's 2018 national curriculum for Mandarin says Zhuyin is taught in the first ten weeks of grade 1, aiming at fluent use by the end of the first learning stage (grades 1 and 2).
Where the tones go: two to four after the syllable (ㄋㄧˇ), the first-tone bar ˉ left out, and the neutral dot ˙ in front in horizontal writing (˙ㄇㄣ).
Mainland China moved to Hanyu Pinyin from 1958. Taiwan's romanisation principles, revised in December 2008 and issued in January 2009, made Hanyu Pinyin the standard for spelling Chinese in Latin letters; Zhuyin teaching did not change.
Unicode's Bopomofo block (U+3100–312F) holds 43 letters: the 37 Mandarin ones (ㄅ U+3105 to ㄩ U+3129), the dialect letters ㄪ ㄫ ㄬ, and the later additions ㄭ ㄮ ㄯ.
A second block, Bopomofo Extended (U+31A0–31BF), adds 32 letters that Unicode groups for Minnan and Hakka, for Hmu and Ge, and for Cantonese.
The tone marks are not Bopomofo characters but borrowed spacing modifiers: the neutral tone is ˙ U+02D9 DOT ABOVE, not the middle dot · U+00B7.
Pairs with RT-CHN-022 (Hanzi → Pinyin) + RT-CHN-024 (Pinyin ↔ Zhuyin) — complete pinyin/zhuyin toolkit.
Frequently Asked Questions
-
This page starts from characters, so it has to choose each character's reading first, and that is where it can go wrong. The Pinyin ↔ Zhuyin converter starts from a syllable you already know (ni3 ↔ ㄋㄧˇ), so no reading has to be chosen.
-
As a draft. Measured on 2 October 2026, it differed from the Ministry of Education's 《國語小字典》 on about 1 character in 30, mostly words whose mainland and Taiwan readings differ (星期, 垃圾). Check the dictionary before printing.
-
No. The conversion runs in your browser.
-
Only to look the readings up. The reading library's word list is in Simplified characters, so Traditional text missed it and fell back to single-character readings: 汽車 came out ㄑㄧˋ ㄐㄩ and 於是 ㄨ ㄕˋ. The lookup now uses a Simplified copy made with OpenCC; the characters on screen are the ones you typed.
-
Yes. Microsoft's Traditional Chinese IME on Windows offers Zhuyin keyboard layouts (Standard and Eten among them), and macOS ships Zhuyin layouts too. This page is for looking readings up, not a replacement for an input method.
-
They are different systems, but they spell the same Mandarin syllables, so one converts to the other syllable by syllable: the Ministry of Education's 中文譯音轉換系統 shows Zhuyin, Hanyu Pinyin, Tongyong Pinyin, MPS II, Wade-Giles and Yale side by side. This page gives only Zhuyin and Hanyu Pinyin.
-
Useful if you are learning in Taiwan, where primary schools teach Zhuyin first. Taiwan's own principles for overseas Chinese teaching say that where a romanisation is used, it should be Hanyu Pinyin.
-
No — Zhuyin spells Mandarin only. English, numbers and punctuation pass through unchanged.
-
Following the Ministry of Education's Zhuyin handbook: tones two to four go at the top right of the last symbol (ㄋㄧˇ); the neutral-tone dot ˙ goes in front of the syllable in horizontal writing (˙ㄇㄣ) and above it in vertical writing.
-
The handbook lists a first-tone bar ˉ but says it is left out when writing Zhuyin, so ㄇㄚ with no mark is first tone. Second tone ˊ, third ˇ, fourth ˋ, neutral ˙ (U+02D9).
Method & sources
How it computes
Only runs of Chinese characters are read; other text passes through. Each run is converted Traditional → Simplified with OpenCC (Taiwan → mainland) as a lookup key only, pinyin-pro chooses each reading in context, and the site's tested Zhuyin kernel spells each syllable. The pinyin row uses the same readings. Against the Zhuyin in MOE's 國語小字典 definitions (2 Oct 2026) it differed on about 1 character in 30; 1 in 19 before the lookup key.
What this tool implements
- Zhuyin spelling and tone placement follow the Ministry of Education's 國語注音符號手冊: tones two to four after the last symbol, the first-tone bar omitted, the neutral-tone dot ˙ (U+02D9) in front in horizontal writing.
- Readings are pinyin-pro's, which follow mainland Putonghua. Taiwan school readings that differ (星期 ㄑㄧˊ, 垃圾 ㄌㄜˋ ㄙㄜˋ) are not substituted, and the page says so; no table derived from the ministry's dictionaries is used.
- Accuracy is stated only as measured against 國語小字典 annotated text on 2 October 2026, never as a general converter error rate.
Sources
- Ministry of Education (Taiwan). 國語注音符號手冊, preface dated November 2000. https://language.moe.gov.tw/001/Upload/files/site_content/M0001/j…
- Ministry of Education (Taiwan). 國語小字典, 2019 data (CC BY-ND 3.0 TW) — the answer key for the accuracy figure. https://language.moe.gov.tw/001/Upload/Files/site_content/M0001/r…
- Ministry of Education (Taiwan). 重編國語辭典修訂本, entries 國語注音符號第一式 (ID 72416) and 第二式 (ID 72415). https://dict.revised.moe.edu.tw/dictView.jsp?ID=72416
- Ministry of Education (Taiwan). 中文譯音使用原則, 法規沿革: revision noted by the Executive Yuan 18 December 2008, issued 5 January 2009. https://edu.law.moe.gov.tw/LawContentSource.aspx?id=GL000499
- Ministry of Education (Taiwan). 十二年國民基本教育課程綱要 語文領域－國語文, January 2018, p. 49.
- Ministry of Education (Taiwan). 中文譯音轉換系統, instructions. https://crptransfer.moe.gov.tw/instruction.jsp
- Unicode Consortium. NamesList.txt, Unicode 18.0.0 (Bopomofo U+3100–312F; Bopomofo Extended U+31A0–31BF). https://www.unicode.org/Public/18.0.0/ucd/NamesList.txt
What can make this go out of date
- Readings come from the vendored pinyin-pro 3.28.1 library; Traditional text is looked up through the vendored opencc-js 1.3.1 Taiwan → mainland converter.
- Where pinyin-pro cannot read a character, the page shows the character as typed and says how many there were.
Pick up where you left off
Stored only in this browser — never sent to our servers.