(fāng): square, power or involution (math.), upright, honest, fair and square, direction

(fāng) is a Chinese character meaning “square.” Classified as HSK Level 3 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of (structural). It ranks #60 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Native pronunciation

Definitions

  1. square
  2. power or involution (math.)
  3. upright
  4. honest
  5. fair and square
  6. direction

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4

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
nounfāng shìway4
nounfāng fǎmethod3
nounfāng miànrespect4
nounfāng xiàngdirection3
nounduì fāngthe other person4
便adjectivefāng biànconvenient3
nounnán fāngsouth3
nounfāng ànplan5
nounshuāng fāngbilateral5
nounguān fānggovernment6
nounběi fāngnorth3
nounqián fāngahead4
西nounxī fāngthe West3
verbbǐ fanganalogy6
nounfāng wèidirection6
noundōng fāngeast3
adjectivedà fāngexpert6
noun/measurepíng fāngsquare (as in square foot, square mile, square root)6
nounyuǎn fāngfar away6
nounfāng yántopolect6
便nounfāng biàn miàninstant noodles3
nounfāng fāng miàn miànall sides6
measurepíng fāng mǐsquare meter6

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
jǐng fāngpolice
jūn fāngmilitary
chǔ fāngmedical prescription
hé fāngwhere?
fāng zhōuark
fāng yuánperimeter
hòu fāngthe rear
dí fāngenemy
fāng kuàicube
100
Total compounds
49
As first character
50
As last character
1
As middle character

appears in 100 compound words: 49 as the first character, 50 as the last, and 1 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.

píng
0.6591,849,854 co-occurrences
qiān
0.637774,072 co-occurrences
0.6091,056,438 co-occurrences
xiàng
0.597934,716 co-occurrences
guān
0.575753,719 co-occurrences
shì
0.570968,299 co-occurrences
miàn
0.5651,034,976 co-occurrences
0.528762,468 co-occurrences
jǐng
0.509299,490 co-occurrences
měi
0.500364,140 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (25)

bǎi jì qiān fāngHSK 4+

to exhaust every means to achieve sth (idiom)

phrase
BùlóngfāngdānHSK 7+

Bloemfontein (a major city and judicial capital of South Africa)

dà zhèng fāng zhēnHSK 5+

major policy of the national government

phrase
dú bà yī fāngHSK 7+

to exercise sole hegemony (idiom); to dominate a whole area (market, resources etc); to hold as one's personal fiefdom

phrase
fāngcùndàluànHSK 6+

to be agitated; to be troubled and nervous

phrase
fāng cùn yǐ luànHSK 6+

(idiom) confused; troubled; bewildered

phrase
fāngxīngwèi'àiHSK 7+

to be ascendant or still growing

phrase
fāng xīng wèi yǐHSK 5+

flourishing and still in the ascendant (idiom); rapidly expanding; still growing strong; on the up

phrase
fāng zī wèi àiHSK 7+

flourishing and still in the ascendant (idiom); rapidly expanding; still growing strong; on the up

phrase
lìngyīfāngmiànHSK 4+

on the other hand

móshù fāngkuàiHSK 7+

Rubik's cube

noun
Nuóyà fāngzhōuHSK 7+

Noah's ark

Showing 12 of 25 idioms containing .

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

这个案还需要进一步完善,特别是细节面。

Zhè gè fāngàn hái xūyào jìnyībù wánshàn, tèbié shì xìjié fāngmiàn.

This plan still needs further improvement, especially in terms of details.

東方日報Feb 2026

日报A1:新春8日 300万港人外游 市...

dōng fāng rì bào A 1 : xīn chūn 8 rì 3 0 0 wàn gǎng rén wài yóu shì . . .

Oriental Daily A1: On the 8th of the Chinese New Year, 3 million Hong Kong people traveled abroad...

Hk01.comFeb 2026

LUNA SEA官公布鼓手真矢不敌病情离世 享年56岁

L U N A S E A guān fāng gōng bù gǔ shǒu zhēn shǐ bù dí bìng qíng lí shì xiǎng nián 5 6 suì

LUNA SEA officially announced that drummer Maya passed away at the age of 56

百度新闻Feb 2026

称欧洲在乌克兰问题上更倾向于延续冲突

é fāng chèn ōu zhōu zài wū kè lán wèn tí shàng gēng qīng xiàng yú yán xù chōng tū

Russia said that Europe is more inclined to continue the conflict on the Ukraine issue

百度新闻Feb 2026

川AG大军注意!雅西高速成都往西昌向多路段车多缓..

chuān dà jūn zhù yì ! yǎ xī gāo sù chéng dū wǎng xī chāng fāng xiàng duō lù duàn chē duō huǎn . .

Sichuan AG army attention! Yaxi Expressway, Chengdu to Xichang direction of many sections of the traffic slow ...

百度新闻Feb 2026

...沈腾马丽同框的机器人 在全国100多个地..

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

...The robot featuring Shen Teng and Ma Li together has been displayed in over 100 locations nationwide...

Tatoeba

今晚七点老地见。没问题吧?

Jīnwǎn qī diǎn lǎodìfāng jiàn. méiwèntí ba?

Can you make it to our usual place at 7:00 p.m. tonight?

Tatoeba

什么时候出发最便你?

Shénme shíhou chūfā zuì fāngbiàn nǐ?

When will it suit you to start?

Tatoeba

他到底躲在什么地呢?

Tā dàodǐ duǒ zài shénme dìfang ne?

I wonder where he is hiding.

Tatoeba

请问这儿是什么地

Qǐngwèn zhèr shì shénmedìfang?

Pardon me, what place is this?

Character Family

Radical Family — Characters sharing the square radical

Homophones — Characters pronounced fāng

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 方 (fāng) mean in Chinese?
方 (fāng) primarily means "square." It is classified as HSK Level 3, making it a beginner-level character. It ranks #60 in character frequency.
How many strokes does 方 have?
方 is written with 4 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 方?
The radical associated with 方 is 方 (square). This radical appears in many characters related to square.
What are the components of 方?
方 is composed of: 亠 (structural). Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 方?
Common words with 方 include: 地方 (dì fāng, "region"); 方式 (fāng shì, "way"); 方法 (fāng fǎ, "method"); 方面 (fāng miàn, "respect"); 方向 (fāng xiàng, "direction"). There are over 100 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 方 (fāng)?
Several characters share the pronunciation fāng: 芳 (fragrant), 防 (to protect), 妨 (to hinder), 房 (house), and 5 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 方 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 方 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.