乖 (guāi): (of a child) obedient, well-behaved, clever, shrewd
乖 (guāi) is a Chinese character meaning “(of a child) obedient, well-behaved.” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 千 (structural) and 北 (structural). It ranks #2386 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).
Definitions
- (of a child) obedient, well-behaved
- clever
- shrewd
Stroke Order
Practice writing 乖 with real-time feedback — trace each stroke in the correct order and build muscle memory in the HanziFeed app.
Words & Compounds
Common Compounds
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 乖乖 | guāi guāi | (of a child) well-behaved |
| 乖巧 | guāi qiǎo | clever (child) |
| 乖张 | guāi zhāng | recalcitrant |
| 乖戾 | guāi lì | perverse (behavior) |
| 卖乖 | mài guāi | to show off one's cleverness |
| 乖僻 | guāi pì | peculiar |
| 上一次当，学一次乖 | shàng yī cì dàng , xué yī cì guāi | to take sth as a lesson for next time (idiom) |
| 得便宜卖乖 | dé pián yi mài guāi | to have benefited from sth but pretend otherwise |
| 讨好卖乖 | tǎo hǎo mài guāi | to curry favor by showing obeisance (idiom) |
| 时乖命蹇 | shí guāi mìng jiǎn | bad times, adverse fate (idiom) |
| 学乖 | xué guāi | to learn one's lesson the hard way |
| 乖觉 | guāi jué | perceptive |
| 乖离 | guāi lí | to part |
| 乖乖女 | guāi guāi nǚ | well-behaved girl |
| 乖顺 | guāi shùn | obedient (colloquial) |
乖 appears in 21 compound words: 62 as the first character, 33 as the last, and 5 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 乖 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.
Idioms & Chengyu (2)
Example Sentences
了解乖字的来源，有助于理解中国文化。
le xiè guāi zì de lái yuán , yǒu zhù yú lǐ xiè zhōng guó wén huā .
Understanding the origin of the character "乖" helps to comprehend Chinese culture.
...市场恐慌 专家揭“川式循环”:过一阵子就乖了
. . . shì chǎng kǒng huāng zhuān jiā jiē chuān shì xún huán : guò yī zhèn zǐ jiù guāi le
永丰投顾:指数逐渐消除与季线乖离 逢低买进机会显现
yǒng fēng tóu gù : zhǐ shǔ zhú jiān xiāo chú yǔ jì xiàn guāi lí féng dī mǎi jìn jī huì xiǎn xiàn
瞄准WBC热潮 乖乖限量应援袋登场
miáo zhǔn W B C rè cháo guāi guāi xiàn liàng yīng yuán dài dēng chǎng
Aiming at the WBC craze, obediently limited support bags appeared
你一旦不做个乖孩子，圣诞老人就不会来噢。
Nǐ yīdàn bù zuò ge guāi háizi, Shèngdàn Lǎorén jiù bù huì lái o.
If you don't behave, Santa won't come.
Character Family
Frequently Asked Questions
What does 乖 (guāi) mean in Chinese?
How many strokes does 乖 have?
What is the radical of 乖?
What are the components of 乖?
What are common words containing 乖?
What characters sound the same as 乖 (guāi)?
Is 乖 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Practice writing 乖 with real-time feedback
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