咕 (gū): (onom.) for the sound of a bird, an empty stomach etc

咕 (gū) is a Chinese character meaning “(onom.) for the sound of a bird, an empty stomach etc.” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 口 (semantic) and 古 (phonetic). It ranks #3009 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 咕 mouth. Its radical form 口 (mouth) appears in many related characters such as 口 (kǒu, mouth), 吃 (chī, to eat), 喝 (hē, to drink).

Native pronunciation
HSK 7-9Radical: 口 mouth8 strokesFrequency #3009口 semantic古 phonetic

Definitions

  1. (onom.) for the sound of a bird, an empty stomach etc

Etymology & Origin

咕

pictophoneticmouth

Decomposition: ⿰口古 (layout: left-right)

Components:口semantic古phonetic

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8

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

Words & Compounds

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
咕噜gū lu(onom.) to rumble (of a stomach)
嘀咕dí guto mutter
咕哝gū nongto murmur
叽里咕噜jī li gū lūsee 嘰哩咕嚕|叽哩咕噜[ji1 li5 gu1 lu1]
咕咚gū dōngsplash
咕唧gū jīto whisper
黑咕隆咚hēi gu lōng dōngpitch-black
犯嘀咕fàn dí guto hesitate
咕咾肉gū lǎo ròusweet and sour meat (pork)
咕噜肉gū lū ròusweet and sour meat (pork)
咕咕叫gū gū jiàosound made by an empty stomach
叽哩咕噜jī li gū lū(onom.) to jabber
搭咕dā gūto connect
乱咕攘luàn gū rangto disturb (dialect)
挤咕jǐ gūto wink at
21
Total compounds
38
As first character
38
As last character
24
As middle character

咕 appears in 21 compound words: 38 as the first character, 38 as the last, and 24 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 咕 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

嘀dī
0.648294 co-occurrences
窿lóng
0.523132 co-occurrences
咧liě
0.48172 co-occurrences
碌lù
0.458114 co-occurrences
哎āi
0.44242 co-occurrences
呜wū
0.42436 co-occurrences
肚dù
0.416138 co-occurrences
鸡jī
0.406198 co-occurrences
汇huì
0.402414 co-occurrences
叫jiào
0.398528 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (3)

黑咕隆咚hēi gu lōng dōngHSK 7+

pitch-black; pitch-dark

phrase
叽叽咕咕jī ji gū gūHSK 7+

(onom.) to mutter; to mumble; to whisper

phrase
叽哩咕噜jīligūlūHSK 7+

mumbling; unclear; unintelligible; growling; rumbling

adjective

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

他咕干舌燥地讲了两个小时，终于说服了大家。

tā gū gān shé zào dì jiǎng le liǎng gè xiǎo shí , zhōng yú shuō fú le dà jiā .

He spoke for two hours, his throat parched, and finally managed to convince everyone.

Character Family

口 Radical Family — Characters sharing the mouth radical

啊a哎āi哀āi唉āi叭bā吧ba哺bǔ嘈cáo唱chàng嘲cháo

Related Characters

口kǒu吃chī喝hē问wèn叫jiào响xiǎng名míng吐tǔ可kě吗ma

Homophones — Characters pronounced gū

估gū沽gū辜gū

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 咕 (gū) mean in Chinese?
咕 (gū) primarily means "(onom.) for the sound of a bird, an empty stomach etc." It is classified as HSK Level 7-9, making it an expert-level character. It ranks #3009 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 咕 and 饱?
咕 (gū) and 饱 (bǎo) are often confused. antonym. The key distinguishing feature: 咕 (empty) vs 饱 (full).
How many strokes does 咕 have?
咕 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 咕?
The radical associated with 咕 is 口 (mouth). This radical appears in many characters related to mouth.
What are the components of 咕?
咕 is composed of: 口 (semantic), 古 (phonetic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰口古 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 咕?
Common words with 咕 include: 咕噜 (gū lu, "(onom.) to rumble (of a stomach)"); 嘀咕 (dí gu, "to mutter"); 咕哝 (gū nong, "to murmur"); 叽里咕噜 (jī li gū lū, "see 嘰哩咕嚕|叽哩咕噜[ji1 li5 gu1 lu1]"); 咕咚 (gū dōng, "splash"). There are over 21 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 咕 (gū)?
Several characters share the pronunciation gū: 估 (to estimate), 沽 (abbr. for Tianjin 天津 (also 津沽)), 辜 (crime). Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 咕 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 咕 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.