决 (jué): to decide, to determine, to execute (sb)

决 (jué) is a Chinese character meaning “to decide.” Classified as HSK Level 3 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 冫 (structural) and 夬 (structural). It ranks #273 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Spoken pronunciation

Definitions

  1. to decide
  2. to determine
  3. to execute (sb)

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6

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

Words & Compounds

HSK Vocabulary with 决

WordPinyinMeaningHSK
决定verb/nounjué dìngto decide3
解决verbjiě juéto solve3
决赛verb/nounjué sàifinals (of a competition)5
决心noun/verbjué xīndetermination5
坚决adjectivejiān juéfirm6
决策verb/nounjué cèstrategic decision6

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
决不adverbjué bùnot at all
判决verbpàn juéjudgment (by a court of law)
取决于verbqǔ jué yúto hinge on
裁决verbcái juéruling
决斗verbjué dòuto duel
处决verbchǔ juéto execute (a condemned criminal)
否决verbfǒu juéto veto
下定决心xià dìng jué xīnto make a firm resolution
表决verbbiǎo juéto decide by vote
决战verbjué zhàndecisive battle
决议nounjué yìa resolution
决定性nounjué dìng xìngdecisive
速决verbsù juéquick decision
犹豫不决phraseyóu yù bù juéhesitancy
半决赛nounbàn jué sàisemifinals
84
Total compounds
32
As first character
42
As last character
26
As middle character

决 appears in 84 compound words: 32 as the first character, 42 as the last, and 26 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 决 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

赛sài
0.732186,090 co-occurrences
定dìng
0.561156,368 co-occurrences
半bàn
0.54437,318 co-occurrences
议yì
0.52334,018 co-occurrences
解jiě
0.50552,350 co-occurrences
坚jiān
0.5047,472 co-occurrences
铜tóng
0.4816,524 co-occurrences
判pàn
0.44419,631 co-occurrences
否fǒu
0.4418,534 co-occurrences
双shuāng
0.4379,190 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (11)

决胜千里jué shèng qiān lǐHSK 5+

to be able to plan victory from a thousand miles away (idiom)

phrase
决一雌雄jué yī cí xióngHSK 7+

see 一決雌雄|一决雌雄

phrase
民族自决mín zú zì juéHSK 4+

self-determination

phrase
速战速决sùzhànsùjuéHSK 5+

to take prompt action to achieve a quick victory; to adopt a blitzkrieg strategy

phrase
先决条件xiānjué tiáojiànHSK 3+

prerequisite; presupposition; precondition

noun
先决问题xiān jué wèn tíHSK 3+

issue that needs to be addressed first (before another issue can be resolved)

phrase
悬而未决xuán'érwèijuéHSK 7+

pending decision; yet to be settled or resolved

phrase
一决雌雄yījuécíxióngHSK 7+

to have a showdown to determine the victor

phrase
毅然决然yìránjuéránHSK 7+

without hesitation; resolutely and determinedly

phrase
犹豫不决yóuyùbùjuéHSK 5+

to be hesitant or indecisive; to waver; to shilly-shally

phrase
踌躇不决chóu chú bù juéHSK 3+

to hesitate; indecisive

phrase

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

他下定决心要戒烟,为了家人的健康着想。

Tā xià dìng juéxīn yào jiè yān, wèi le jiārén de jiànkāng zhuóxiǎng.

He made up his mind to quit smoking for the health of his family.

Hk01.comFeb 2026

美贸易代表:关税裁决不影响中美贸易协议 也不影响特朗普访华

měi mào yì dài biǎo : guān shuì cái jué bù yǐng xiǎng zhōng měi mào yì xié yì yě bù yǐng xiǎng tè lǎng pǔ fǎng huá

U.S. Trade Representative: The tariff ruling will not affect the Sino-US trade agreement nor will it affect Trump's visit to China

中国新闻网_梳理天下新闻Feb 2026

“超级皖”美食争霸赛总决赛收官 豆腐发源地淮南夺冠

chāo jí 皖 měi shí zhēng bà sài zǒng jué sài shōu guān dòu fǔ fā yuán dì huái nán duó guàn

The finals of the "Super Anhui" Food Championship ended with Huainan, the birthplace of tofu, winning the championship

Yahoo FinanceFeb 2026

...朗普向全球加征关税至15% 回应最高院判决 另引例实施150日

. . . lǎng pǔ xiàng quán qiú jiā zhēng guān shuì zhì 1 5 huí yīng zuì gāo yuàn pàn jué lìng yǐn lì shí shī 1 5 0 rì

... Trump imposed tariffs on the world to 15% in response to the Supreme Court's ruling and cited another example for 150 days

Nownews今日新聞Feb 2026

...队如何断加拿大连霸梦?三个维度解读史诗对决

. . . duì rú hé duàn jiā ná dà lián bà mèng ? sān gè wéi dù jiě dòu shǐ shī duì jué

... How did the team break Canada's dream of winning back-to-back championships? Interpret the epic showdown in three dimensions

百度新闻Feb 2026

...理会就利比亚局势展开磋商 中方呼吁和平解决政治分..

. . . lǐ huì jiù lì bǐ yà jú shì zhǎn kāi cuō shāng zhōng fāng hū xū hé píng xiè jué zhèng zhì fēn . .

... Council to start consultations on Libya situation China calls for peaceful resolution of political separat...

Tatoeba

他为什么仍然犹豫不决?

Tā wèishénme réngrán yóuyùbùjué?

Why did he remain hesitant?

Tatoeba

我决定去美国,而不是欧洲。

Wǒ juédìng qù Měiguó, ér bù shì ōuzhōu.

Instead of going to Europe, I decided to go to America.

Tatoeba

花子决心要去巴黎。

Huāzi juéxīn yào qù Bālí.

Hanako is set on going to Paris.

Tatoeba

她决心要辞职离开公司。

Tā juéxīn yào cízhí líkāi gōngsī.

She is determined to leave the company.

Character Family

Homophones — Characters pronounced jué

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 决 (jué) mean in Chinese?
决 (jué) primarily means "to decide." It is classified as HSK Level 3, making it a beginner-level character. It ranks #273 in character frequency.
How many strokes does 决 have?
决 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 决?
The radical associated with 决 is 冫 (ice). This radical appears in many characters related to ice.
What are the components of 决?
决 is composed of: 冫 (structural), 夬 (structural). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰冫夬 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 决?
Common words with 决 include: 决定 (jué dìng, "to decide"); 解决 (jiě jué, "to solve"); 决赛 (jué sài, "finals (of a competition)"); 决不 (jué bù, "not at all"); 判决 (pàn jué, "judgment (by a court of law)"). There are over 84 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 决 (jué)?
Several characters share the pronunciation jué: 觉 (to feel, to sleep), 绝 (absolutely, to cut off), 爵 (ancient bronze wine holder with 3 legs and loop handle), 掘 (to dig), and 3 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 决 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
No. The simplified form is 决 and the traditional form is 決.

Practice writing 决 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.