哎 (āi): hey!, (interjection used to attract attention or to express surprise or disapprobation)

哎 (āi) is a Chinese character meaning “hey!.” Classified as HSK Level 5 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 口 (semantic) and 艾 (phonetic). It ranks #2234 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 哎 mouth. Its radical form 口 (mouth) appears in many related characters such as 口 (kǒu, mouth), 叫 (jiào, to call, to be called), 右 (yòu, (bound form) right).

Native pronunciation
HSK 5Radical: 口 mouth9 strokesFrequency #2234口 semantic艾 phonetic

Definitions

  1. hey!
  2. (interjection used to attract attention or to express surprise or disapprobation)

Etymology & Origin

哎

pictophoneticmouth

Decomposition: ⿰口艾 (layout: left-right)

Components:口semantic艾phonetic

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8

Practice writing 哎 with real-time feedback — trace each stroke in the correct order and build muscle memory in the HanziFeed app.

Words & Compounds

HSK Vocabulary with 哎

WordPinyinMeaningHSK
哎呀interjectionāi yāinterjection of wonder, shock or admiration5

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
哎哟āi yōhey
哎唷āi yōinterjection of pain or surprise
哎呦āi yōu(interjection of surprise, pain, annoyance etc)
4
Total compounds
100
As first character
0
As last character
0
As middle character

哎 appears in 4 compound words: 100 as the first character, 0 as the last, and 0 in a middle position. Compound statistics computed from SUBTLEX-CH and HSK 3.0 vocabulary data.

Strongest Collocations

Characters that most frequently co-occur with 哎 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

呀yā
0.7742,367 co-occurrences
嘿hēi
0.672420 co-occurrences
喂wéi
0.561174 co-occurrences
呵hē
0.553144 co-occurrences
咕gū
0.44242 co-occurrences
啊a
0.43184 co-occurrences
乖guāi
0.41636 co-occurrences
妈mā
0.40054 co-occurrences
我wǒ
0.314262 co-occurrences
你nǐ
0.305108 co-occurrences

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

请哎下这杯茶，解解渴再继续工作。

qǐng āi xià zhè bēi chá , xiè xiè kě zài jì xù gōng zuò .

Please have a sip of this tea to quench your thirst before continuing your work.

Tatoeba

哎哟，撞到你了，对不起！

āiyō, zhuàngdào nǐ le, duìbuqǐ!

Ah, I hit you, sorry!

Tatoeba

哎呦好难受啊，全身发痒！

āiyōu hǎo nánshòu ā, quánshēn fāyǎng!

Grr! I'm itchy all over, and it's driving me crazy.

Tatoeba

哎，马上就要考试了。我死定了！

āi, mǎshàng jiùyào kǎoshì le. wǒ sǐdìng le!

Ah, it's almost time for exams. I'm dead!

Tatoeba

哎呀，差点上课迟到！

āiyā, chàdiǎn shàngkè chídào!

Ach, I was almost late to class!

Tatoeba

哎，今天真丢人，我把衣服穿反了。

āi, jīntiān zhēn diūrén, wǒ bǎ yīfu chuānfǎn le.

Argh, I was so embarrassed today. I wore my clothes inside-out.

Tatoeba

哎呀，我们好像忘了汤姆。

āiyā, wǒmen hǎoxiàng wàng le Tāngmǔ.

Oops, I think we forgot Tom.

Tatoeba

哎呀我不知道啦。

āiyā wǒ bù zhīdào la.

Oh, I don't know.

Character Family

口 Radical Family — Characters sharing the mouth radical

啊a哀āi唉āi叭bā吧ba哺bǔ嘈cáo唱chàng嘲cháo吵chǎo

Related Characters

口kǒu叫jiào右yòu号hào吃chī同tóng名míng后hòu吗ma吧ba

Homophones — Characters pronounced āi

哀āi唉āi挨āi癌ái矮ǎi蔼ǎi艾ài爱ài隘ài碍ài

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 哎 (āi) mean in Chinese?
哎 (āi) primarily means "hey!." It is classified as HSK Level 5, making it an advanced character. It ranks #2234 in character frequency.
How many strokes does 哎 have?
哎 is written with 9 strokes. The correct stroke order matters for recognition and handwriting speed — practice with the animated guide above to build proper technique.
What is the radical of 哎?
The radical associated with 哎 is 口 (mouth). This radical appears in many characters related to mouth.
What are the components of 哎?
哎 is composed of: 口 (semantic), 艾 (phonetic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰口艾 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 哎?
Common words with 哎 include: 哎呀 (āi yā, "interjection of wonder, shock or admiration"); 哎哟 (āi yō, "hey"); 哎唷 (āi yō, "interjection of pain or surprise"); 哎呦 (āi yōu, "(interjection of surprise, pain, annoyance etc)"). There are over 4 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 哎 (āi)?
Several characters share the pronunciation āi: 哀 (Ai (c. 2000 BC), sixth of legendary Flame Emperors 炎帝 descended from Shennong 神農|神农 Farmer God, also known as Li 釐|厘), 唉 (interjection or grunt of agreement or recognition (e.g. yes, it's me!)), 挨 (in order), 癌 (cancer), and 6 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 哎 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 哎 is written the same way in both simplified and traditional Chinese.

Practice writing 哎 with real-time feedback

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Character data sourced from Unihan (Unicode Consortium), SUBTLEX-CH frequency corpus (Cai & Brysbaert, 2010), and Make Me a Hanzi (stroke data). Collocation strength measured via NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information). Verified by the HanziFeed linguistics team.

HSK classification follows the HSK 3.0 Standard (Center for Language Education and Cooperation, CLEC, 2022 revision). Idiom data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).

Data last verified: March 2026.