诧 (chà): to be surprised, to be astonished

诧 (chà) is a Chinese character meaning “to be surprised.” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 讠 (semantic) and 宅 (phonetic). It ranks #2586 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 诧 speech. Its radical form 讠 (speech) appears in many related characters such as 认 (rèn, to recognize, to admit), 记 (jì, to remember, to record), 识 (shí, to know, knowledge).

Native pronunciation
HSK 7-9Radical: 讠 speech8 strokesFrequency #2586讠 semantic宅 phonetic

Definitions

  1. to be surprised
  2. to be astonished

Etymology & Origin

诧

pictophoneticspeech

Decomposition: ⿰讠宅 (layout: left-right)

Components:讠semantic宅phonetic

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8

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

Words & Compounds

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
诧异chà yìflabbergasted
惊诧jīng chàto be surprised
甚感诧异shèn gǎn chà yìamazed
3
Total compounds
33
As first character
33
As last character
33
As middle character

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

惊jīng
0.573276 co-occurrences
异yì
0.534408 co-occurrences
蚁yǐ
0.51766 co-occurrences
叹tàn
0.46830 co-occurrences
曰yuē
0.37960 co-occurrences
感gǎn
0.362126 co-occurrences
启qǐ
0.34430 co-occurrences
闻wén
0.33330 co-occurrences
很hěn
0.30048 co-occurrences
见jiàn
0.28130 co-occurrences

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

诧语是交流思想的重要工具。

chà yǔ shì jiāo liú sī xiǎng de chóng yāo gōng jù .

Language is an essential tool for communicating ideas.

Character Family

讠 Radical Family — Characters sharing the speech radical

谤bàng诚chéng词cí诞dàn调diào谍dié订dìng讹é访fǎng诽fěi

Related Characters

认rèn记jì识shí诉sù试shì话huà语yǔ说shuō请qǐng读dòu

Homophones — Characters pronounced chà

叉chā插chā查chá茶chá察chá岔chà差chā刹chà

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 诧 (chà) mean in Chinese?
诧 (chà) primarily means "to be surprised." It is classified as HSK Level 7-9, making it an expert-level character. It ranks #2586 in character frequency.
How many strokes does 诧 have?
诧 is written with 8 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 诧?
The radical associated with 诧 is 讠 (speech). This radical appears in many characters related to speech.
What are the components of 诧?
诧 is composed of: 讠 (semantic), 宅 (phonetic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰讠宅 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 诧?
Common words with 诧 include: 诧异 (chà yì, "flabbergasted"); 惊诧 (jīng chà, "to be surprised"); 甚感诧异 (shèn gǎn chà yì, "amazed"). There are over 3 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 诧 (chà)?
Several characters share the pronunciation chà: 叉 (fork), 插 (to insert), 查 (to check, to investigate), 茶 (tea), and 4 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 诧 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 诧 is written the same way in both simplified and traditional Chinese.

Practice writing 诧 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.