狈 (bèi): a legendary wolf, distressed, wretched

狈 (bèi) is a Chinese character meaning “a legendary wolf.” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 犭 (semantic) and 贝 (phonetic). It ranks #2792 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 狈 dog. Its radical form 犭 (dog) appears in many related characters such as 狗 (gǒu, dog), 猫 (māo, cat (CL:隻|只[zhi1])), 状 (zhuàng, (bound form) form).

Native pronunciation
HSK 7-9Radical: 犭 dog7 strokesFrequency #2792犭 semantic贝 phonetic

Definitions

  1. a legendary wolf
  2. distressed
  3. wretched

Etymology & Origin

狈

pictophoneticdog

Decomposition: ⿰犭贝 (layout: left-right)

Components:犭semantic贝phonetic

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7

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

Words & Compounds

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
狼狈láng bèiin a difficult situation
狼狈为奸láng bèi wéi jiānvillains collude together (idiom)
狼狈不堪láng bèi bù kānbattered and exhausted
3
Total compounds
0
As first character
33
As last character
67
As middle character

狈 appears in 3 compound words: 0 as the first character, 33 as the last, and 67 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 狈 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

狼láng
0.6741,613 co-occurrences
奸jiān
0.564312 co-occurrences
窜cuàn
0.51536 co-occurrences
堪kān
0.485144 co-occurrences
逃táo
0.452280 co-occurrences
惧jù
0.42030 co-occurrences
奔bēn
0.40360 co-occurrences
走zǒu
0.32778 co-occurrences
恐kǒng
0.31430 co-occurrences
败bài
0.30930 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (2)

狼狈不堪láng bèi bù kānHSK 7+

battered and exhausted; stuck in a dilemma

phrase
狼狈为奸lángbèiwéijiānHSK 7+

to act in collusion with each other; to work hand in glove with somebody (to nefarious ends)

phrase

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

我在字典里查到了狈字的详细解释。

wǒ zài zì diǎn lǐ chá dào le bèi zì de xiáng xì xiè shì .

I looked up the detailed explanation of the character "狈" in the dictionary.

Nownews今日新聞Feb 2026

北市医美诊所开枪!枪手换装9次“狼狈逃700KM”躲阿里山民宿被逮

běi shì yī měi zhěn suǒ kāi qiāng ! qiāng shǒu huàn zhuāng 9 cì láng bèi táo 7 0 0 K M duǒ ā lǐ shān mín sù bèi dǎi

Beishi Medical Aesthetic Clinic shoots! The gunman changed his clothes 9 times and "fled 700KM in embarrassment" and was arrested to hide in Alishan B&B

Character Family

犭 Radical Family — Characters sharing the dog radical

猜cāi猖chāng独dú犯fàn狗gǒu狠hěn猴hóu狐hú猾huá狡jiǎo

Related Characters

狗gǒu猫māo状zhuàng猪zhū独dú犹yóu狂kuáng猜cāi献xiàn猴hóu

Homophones — Characters pronounced bèi

卑bēi杯bēi悲bēi北běi贝bèi备bèi

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 狈 (bèi) mean in Chinese?
狈 (bèi) primarily means "a legendary wolf." It is classified as HSK Level 7-9, making it an expert-level character. It ranks #2792 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 狈 and 败?
狈 (bèi) and 败 (bài) are often confused. confusable. The key distinguishing feature: 犭 vs 贝 (same 贝 component).
How many strokes does 狈 have?
狈 is written with 7 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 狈?
The radical associated with 狈 is 犭 (dog). This radical appears in many characters related to dog.
What are the components of 狈?
狈 is composed of: 犭 (semantic), 贝 (phonetic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰犭贝 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 狈?
Common words with 狈 include: 狼狈 (láng bèi, "in a difficult situation"); 狼狈为奸 (láng bèi wéi jiān, "villains collude together (idiom)"); 狼狈不堪 (láng bèi bù kān, "battered and exhausted"). There are over 3 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 狈 (bèi)?
Several characters share the pronunciation bèi: 卑 (low), 杯 (cup, glass), 悲 (sad), 北 (north), and 2 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 狈 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 狈 is written the same way in both simplified and traditional Chinese.

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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.