暧 (ài): (of daylight) dim

暧 (ài) is a Chinese character meaning “(of daylight) dim.” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 日 (semantic) and 爱 (phonetic). It ranks #3053 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 暧 sun. Its radical form 日 (sun) appears in many related characters such as 日 (rì, sun, day), 时 (shí, time, hour), 明 (míng, bright, tomorrow).

Spoken pronunciation

Definitions

  1. (of daylight) dim

Etymology & Origin

暧

pictophoneticsun

Decomposition: ⿰日爱 (layout: left-right)

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14

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

Words & Compounds

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
暧昧adjectiveài mèivague
暧昧关系ài mèi guān xìshady relationship
2
Total compounds
100
As first character
0
As last character
0
As middle character

暧 appears in 2 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 暧 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

昧mèi
0.8351,003 co-occurrences
糊hú
0.42428 co-occurrences
关guān
0.421274 co-occurrences
态tài
0.41090 co-occurrences
郭guō
0.40364 co-occurrences
系xì
0.381266 co-occurrences
恋liàn
0.37312 co-occurrences
渐jiàn
0.32414 co-occurrences

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

暧落西山,晚霞映红了半边天。

ài luò xī shān , wǎn xiá yìng hóng le bàn biān tiān .

The sun was setting behind the western mountains, and the evening glow lit up half the sky.

少数派Apr 2026

暧昧的氛围之余,又以留白营造空气感,泛着日常的醍醐味。

ài mèi de fēn wéi zhī yú , yòu yǐ liú bái yíng zào kōng qì gǎn , fàn zhe rì cháng de 醍 醐 wèi .

Amid the ambiguous atmosphere, the use of negative space creates a sense of airiness, exuding the subtle charm of everyday life.

三立新聞網Mar 2026

俐蓁爆暧昧男队友同返住处 松口真实关系

俐 蓁 bào ài mèi nán duì yǒu tóng fǎn zhù chǔ sōng kǒu zhēn shí guān xì

Li Zhen Spotted Returning to Her Residence with a Male Teammate Amid Rumors of a Romance; Opens Up About Their True Relationship

EttodayMar 2026

暧昧建材业陈杰宪见光死!杨千霈生日趴“他盛...

ài mèi jiàn cái yè chén jié xiàn jiàn guāng sǐ ! yáng qiān 霈 shēng rì pā tā shèng . . .

Chen Jiexian, linked to the construction industry, can’t handle the spotlight! At Yang Qianpei’s birthday party, “he was...

Hk01.comFeb 2026

5星座爱搞暧昧把你当备胎 天秤优柔寡断 这星座关心超...

5 xīng zuò ài gǎo ài mèi bǎ nǐ dāng bèi tāi tiān chēng yōu róu guǎ duàn zhè xīng zuò guān xīn chāo . . .

5 zodiac signs love to be ambiguous and treat you as a spare tire Libra is indecisive This zodiac sign cares about the super...

EttodayFeb 2026

GOT7 Jay B传暧昧情! “同款情侣帽、背景”爆热恋74万...

G O T 7 J a y B chuán ài mèi qíng ! tóng kuǎn qíng lǚ mào , bèi jǐng bào rè liàn 7 4 wàn . . .

GOT7 Jay B conveys ambiguous love! "The same couple hat and background" exploded 740,000 people...

Character Family

Semantic Family — Characters sharing the 日 (sun) component

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 暧 (ài) mean in Chinese?
暧 (ài) primarily means "(of daylight) dim." It is classified as HSK Level 7-9, making it an expert-level character. It ranks #3053 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 暧 and 明?
暧 (ài) and 明 (míng) are often confused. antonym. The key distinguishing feature: 暧 (dim) vs 明 (bright).
How many strokes does 暧 have?
暧 is written with 14 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 暧?
The radical associated with 暧 is 日 (sun). This radical appears in many characters related to sun.
What are the components of 暧?
暧 is composed of: 日 (semantic), 爱 (phonetic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰日爱 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 暧?
Common words with 暧 include: 暧昧 (ài mèi, "vague"); 暧昧关系 (ài mèi guān xì, "shady relationship"). There are over 2 compound words containing this character.
Is 暧 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 暧 is written the same way in both simplified and traditional Chinese.

Practice writing 暧 with real-time feedback

Trace stroke sequences, hear spoken pronunciation, and build lasting retention with spaced repetition in the HanziFeed app.

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.