(): earth, ground

() is a Chinese character meaning “earth, ground.” Classified as HSK Level 2 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of (semantic) and (phonetic). It ranks #21 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, earth. Its radical form (earth) appears in many related characters such as (zài, to exist), (chǎng, field, place), (huài, bad, broken).

Native pronunciation

Definitions

  1. earth, ground

Etymology & Origin

pictophoneticearth

Decomposition: ⿰土也 (layout: left-right)

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6

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

Words & Compounds

HSK Vocabulary with

WordPinyinMeaningHSK
noundì fāngregion3
noundì qiúthe earth4
noundì zhǐaddress4
noundì diǎnplace3
noundì qūregion5
noundì túmap3
nounjī dìbase (of operations, industrial, military, research etc)6
nountǔ dìland5
noundāng dìlocal5
noun/adjectivedì xiàunderground5
nounběn dìlocal5
noundì tiěunderground railway2
noundì miànfloor5
verbdì zhènearthquake5
noundì wèiposition5
noungè dìin all parts of (a country)4
nounmù dì dìdestination (location)4
nounchǎng dìspace6
noundà dìearth6
adjectivedì dàotunnel6
noungōng dìconstruction site6
nouncǎo dìlawn3
adverbtè dìspecially6
noundì lǐgeography5
kōng dìair-to-surface (missile)6
nounlù dìdry land (as opposed to the sea)5
verbluò dìto fall to the ground6
noundì xíngtopography6
nounwài dìparts of the country other than where one is3
noundì yùarea6
noundì zhìgeology6
verb/adverbbiàn dìeverywhere6
verbzhòng dìto farm6
nounchǎn dìsource (of a product)6
100
Total compounds
67
As first character
33
As last character
0
As middle character

appears in 100 compound words: 67 as the first character, 33 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 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

kěn
0.641675,834 co-occurrences
0.5831,368,822 co-occurrences
jìn
0.574965,010 co-occurrences
zhèn
0.525203,989 co-occurrences
lín
0.520761,466 co-occurrences
0.506448,363 co-occurrences
dāng
0.492474,114 co-occurrences
xīng
0.492878,574 co-occurrences
zhí
0.487134,910 co-occurrences
fāng
0.4871,153,829 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (92)

ābí dìyùHSK 7+

Avīci (the lowest level of the “hell” realm)

noun
biàndìkāihuāHSK 3+

to proliferate and become widespread; to spring up everywhere

verb
bùbàizhīdìHSK 4+

invincible position

phrase
bùmáozhīdìHSK 4+

barren land; desert

phrase
dànwánzhīdìHSK 7+

a tiny place

phrase
Dìzàng PúsàHSK 7+

Kṣitigarbha bodhisattva

dìdòng shānyáoHSK 5+

earthshaking

phrase
广dìguǎngrénxīHSK 7+

vast territory with a sparse population

phrase
dì jiǎo tiān yáHSK 7+

The ends of the earth

phrase
dìjiǔtiānchángHSK 3+

alternative form of 天長地久 /天长地久 (tiānchángdìjiǔ)

phrase
dìlǎotiānhuāngHSK 7+

alternative form of 天荒地老 (tiānhuāngdìlǎo)

noun
dìlǐ wèizhìHSK 5+

geographical location

noun

Showing 12 of 92 idioms containing .

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

震发生后,当政府立即启动了应急预案。

Dìzhèn fāshēng hòu, dāngdì zhèngfǔ lìjí qǐdòng le yìngjí yù'àn.

After the earthquake, the local government immediately activated the emergency plan.

百度新闻Feb 2026

联合国:收到伊朗来信 对区紧张局势深表关切

lián gě guó : shōu dào yī lǎng lái xìn duì dì qū jǐn zhāng jú shì shēn biǎo guān qiē

United Nations: Received a letter from Iran expressing deep concern about regional tensions

百度新闻Feb 2026

超标近2000倍 日本石川县一处下水检出高浓度有..

chāo biāo jìn bèi rì běn shí chuān xiàn yī chǔ dì xià shuǐ jiǎn chū gāo nóng dù yǒu . .

Nearly 2,000 times the limit, a groundwater in Ishikawa Prefecture, Japan, was found to have high concentrations of...

百度新闻Feb 2026

忻州市房产市场多项指标居全省首位

忻 zhōu shì fáng dì chǎn shì chǎng duō xiàng zhǐ biāo jū quán shěng shǒu wèi

Xinzhou real estate market tops the province in a number of indicators

百度新闻Feb 2026

...与沈腾马丽同框的机器人 在全国100多个方..

. . . yú 沈 téng mǎ lí tóng kuàng de jī qì rén zài quán guó duō gě dì fāng . .

... The robot that shares a frame with Shen Teng and Ma Li is in more than 100 places across the country...

百度新闻Feb 2026

点亮中国红!英国标伦敦眼披上中国春节装扮

diǎn liàng zhōng guó hóng ! yīng guó dì biāo lún dūn yǎn pī shǎng zhōng guó chūn jié zhuāng bàn

Light Up China Red! London Eye Dons Chinese New Year Decorations

Tatoeba

您能把图传真给我吗?

Nín néng bǎ dìtú chuánzhēn gěi wǒ ma?

Could you send me a map by facsimile?

Tatoeba

他从什么方来的?

Tā cóng shénmedìfang lái de?

Where does he come from?

Tatoeba

对了,可以把你的址告诉我吗?

Duìle, kěyǐ bǎ nǐ de dìzhǐ gàosu wǒ ma?

By the way, what is your address?

Tatoeba

请问这儿是什么方?

Qǐngwèn zhèr shì shénmedìfang?

Pardon me, what place is this?

Character Family

Homophones — Characters pronounced

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 地 (dì) mean in Chinese?
地 (dì) primarily means "earth, ground." It is classified as HSK Level 2, making it a beginner-level character. It ranks #21 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 地 and 池?
地 (dì) and 池 (chí) are often confused. confusable. The key distinguishing feature: 土 vs 氵 (same 也 component).
How many strokes does 地 have?
地 is written with 6 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 地?
The radical associated with 地 is 土 (earth). This radical appears in many characters related to earth.
What are the components of 地?
地 is composed of: 土 (semantic), 也 (phonetic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰土也 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 地?
Common words with 地 include: 地方 (dì fāng, "region"); 地球 (dì qiú, "the earth"); 地址 (dì zhǐ, "address"); 地点 (dì diǎn, "place"); 地区 (dì qū, "region"). There are over 100 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 地 (dì)?
Several characters share the pronunciation dì: 低 (low), 堤 (dike), 滴 (to drip), 迪 (to enlighten), and 3 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 地 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 地 is written the same way in both simplified and traditional Chinese.

Practice writing with real-time feedback

Trace stroke sequences, hear native 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.