德 (dé): Germany, German, abbr. for 德國|德国

德 (dé) is a Chinese character meaning “germany.” Classified as HSK Level 6 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 彳 (structural), 十 (structural), 罒 (structural), 一 (structural) and 心 (semantic). It ranks #256 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 德 heart. Its radical form 彳 (step) appears in many related characters such as 很 (hěn, very), 得 (dé, to obtain), 往 (wǎng, to go (in a direction)).

Spoken pronunciation

Definitions

  1. Germany
  2. German
  3. abbr. for 德國|德国

Etymology & Origin

德

pictophoneticheart

Decomposition: ⿰彳⿱⿱十罒⿱一心 (layout: left-right)

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15

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

Words & Compounds

HSK Vocabulary with 德

WordPinyinMeaningHSK
道德noun/adjectivedào dévirtue6

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
德国proper-noundé guóGermany
西德proper-nounxī déWest Germany
霍华德proper-nounhuò huá dé(name) Howard
德克萨斯proper-noundé kè sà sīTexas, US state
德州proper-noundé zhōuTexas (abbr. for 德克薩斯州|德克萨斯州)
爱德华proper-nounài dé huáEdward
德语noundé yǔGerman (language)
理查德proper-nounlǐ chá déRichard (name)
哈罗德hā luó déHarold, Harald, Harrod (name)
韦德wéi déWade (name)
邦德bāng déBond (name)
安德鲁proper-nounān dé lǔAndrew (name)
庞德páng déPound (name)...
阿萨德proper-nounā sà déAssad (Arabic name)
桑德拉sāng dé lāSandra (name)
128
Total compounds
29
As first character
62
As last character
9
As middle character

德 appears in 128 compound words: 29 as the first character, 62 as the last, and 9 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 德 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

赖lài
0.525124 co-occurrences
茨cí
0.52050 co-occurrences
罕hǎn
0.52020,816 co-occurrences
尔ěr
0.511134,028 co-occurrences
穆mù
0.49028,176 co-occurrences
拉lā
0.476110,362 co-occurrences
伍wǔ
0.47527,310 co-occurrences
雷léi
0.47254,066 co-occurrences
哈hā
0.46545,098 co-occurrences
里lǐ
0.465121,906 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (45)

阿德雷德ĀdéléidéHSK 6+

Alternative name for 阿德萊德/阿德莱德 (Ādéláidé).: Adelaide (the state capital and largest city in South Australia, Australia)

埃德蒙顿Āidéméngdùn

(chiefly Mainland China) Edmonton (the capital city of Alberta, Canada)

艾德蒙顿ÀidéméngdùnHSK 7+

(chiefly Taiwan) Edmonton (the capital city of Alberta, Canada)

艾哈迈德ÀihāmàidéHSK 7+

a transliteration of the Arabic male given name and surname أَحْمَد (ʔaḥmad), Ahmad

爱德华兹ÀidéhuázīHSK 7+

a transliteration of the English surname Edwards

奥德修斯ÀodéxiūsīHSK 7+

Odysseus

波德里查BōdélǐcháHSK 7+

Podgorica (the capital city of Montenegro)

道德绑架dàodé bǎngjiàHSK 7+

to hijack morality to condemn someone; to occupy the moral high ground to dictate what others should do

phrase
德才兼备décáijiānbèiHSK 6+

having both talents and morals; having both ability and integrity

phrase
德高望重dé gāo wàng zhòngHSK 6+

(idiom) a person of virtue and prestige; a person of good moral standing and reputation

phrase
德国麻疹dé guó má zhěn

German measles; rubella

phrase
德克萨斯DékèsàsīHSK 7+

(chiefly Taiwan) Texas (a state in the south-central region of the United States)

Showing 12 of 45 idioms containing 德.

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

学习德字需要反复练习,才能写得工整。

xué xí dé zì xū yāo fǎn fù liàn xí , cái néng xiě dé gōng zhěng .

Mastering the character "德" requires repeated practice to write it neatly.

LtnFeb 2026

阿曼证实美伊2/26日内瓦再谈 传德黑兰愿就核计画让步

ā 曼 zhèng shí měi yī 2 2 6 rì nèi wǎ zài tán chuán dé hēi lán yuàn jiù hé jì huà ràng bù

Oman confirmed that the United States and Iran will talk again in Geneva on 2/26 and it is rumored that Tehran is willing to make concessions on the nuclear program

Fx168 Finance NetworkFeb 2026

...%全球关税为中国送上“减税大礼”,英法日德成“最大输家”-FX168

. . . quán qiú guān shuì wéi zhōng guó sòng shàng jiǎn shuì dà lǐ , yīng fǎ rì dé chéng zuì dà shū jiā F X 1 6 8

...% Global tariffs have sent a "tax reduction gift" to China, and Britain, France and Japan have become the "biggest losers" - FX168

WorldjournalFeb 2026

冬奥/越野滑雪收官战:瑞典名将安德松女子50公里夺金

dōng ào yuè yě huá xuě shōu guān zhàn : ruì diǎn míng jiāng ān dé sōng nǚ zǐ 5 0 gōng lǐ duó jīn

Winter Olympics/Cross-country Skiing Finale: Sweden's Andersson won gold in the women's 50km

UdnnewsindexFeb 2026

...API石油钢管大厂天声将斥资13亿元前进德州

. . . A P I shí yóu gāng guǎn dà hǎn tiān shēng jiāng chì zī 1 3 yì yuán qián jìn dé zhōu

... API petroleum steel pipe manufacturer Tiansheng will spend 1.3 billion yuan to advance to Texas

百度新闻Feb 2026

美国这座机场要改名“唐纳德·特朗普国际机场”

měi guó zhè zuò jī chǎng yāo gǎi míng táng nà dé tè lǎng pǔ guó jì jī chǎng

The airport in the United States will be renamed "Donald Trump International Airport"

Tatoeba

尼德兰的首都是什么?

Nídélán de shǒudū shì shén me?

What is the capital of the Netherlands?

Tatoeba

忍耐是最美的美德。

Rěnnài shì zuì měi de měidé.

Patience is the most beautiful virtue.

Tatoeba

瑞典的首都是斯德哥尔摩。

Ruìdiǎn de shǒudū shì Sīdégē'ěrmó.

The capital of Sweden is Stockholm.

Tatoeba

梅纳德不能自己去上厕所。

Méinàdé bù néng zìjǐ qù shàng cèsuǒ.

Mennad couldn't go to the toilet by himself.

Character Family

Semantic Family — Characters sharing the 心 (heart) component

Homophones — Characters pronounced dé

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 德 (dé) mean in Chinese?
德 (dé) primarily means "germany." It is classified as HSK Level 6, making it an advanced character. It ranks #256 in character frequency.
How many strokes does 德 have?
德 is written with 15 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 德?
The radical associated with 德 is 彳 (step). This radical appears in many characters related to step.
What are the components of 德?
德 is composed of: 彳 (structural), 十 (structural), 罒 (structural), 一 (structural), 心 (semantic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰彳⿱⿱十罒⿱一心 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 德?
Common words with 德 include: 德国 (dé guó, "Germany"); 西德 (xī dé, "West Germany"); 道德 (dào dé, "virtue"); 霍华德 (huò huá dé, "(name) Howard"); 德克萨斯 (dé kè sà sī, "Texas, US state"). There are over 128 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 德 (dé)?
Several characters share the pronunciation dé: 的 (of), 得 (to obtain). Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 德 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 德 is written the same way in both simplified and traditional Chinese.

Practice writing 德 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.