狸 (lí): raccoon dog

狸 (lí) is a Chinese character meaning “raccoon dog.” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 犭 (semantic) and 里 (phonetic). It ranks #3077 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 狸 dog. Its radical form 犭 (dog) appears in many related characters such as 狗 (gǒu, dog), 猫 (māo, cat (CL:隻|只[zhi1])), 猜 (cāi, to guess).

Native pronunciation
HSK 7-9Radical: 犭 dog10 strokesFrequency #3077犭 semantic里 phonetic

Definitions

  1. raccoon dog

Etymology & Origin

狸

pictophoneticdog

Decomposition: ⿰犭里 (layout: left-right)

Components:犭semantic里phonetic

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10

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

Words & Compounds

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
狐狸hú lifox
海狸hǎi líbeaver
狐狸精hú li jīngfox-spirit
狐狸尾巴hú li wěi balit. fox's tail (idiom)
老狐狸lǎo hú liold fox
狸猫lí māoleopard cat
河狸hé líbeaver
狸子lí zileopard cat
果子狸guǒ zi límasked palm civet (Paguma larvata)
海狸鼠hǎi lí shǔ(zoology) coypu
穷鼠啮狸qióng shǔ niè lía desperate rat will bite the fox (idiom)
狐狸座hú li zuòVulpecula (constellation)
熊狸xióng líbinturong or bearcat (Arctictis binturong)
沼狸zhǎo límeerkat
14
Total compounds
14
As first character
57
As last character
29
As middle character

狸 appears in 14 compound words: 14 as the first character, 57 as the last, and 29 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 狸 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

狐hú
0.80120,038 co-occurrences
藻zǎo
0.6927,320 co-occurrences
猫māo
0.473894 co-occurrences
囊náng
0.401396 co-occurrences
河hé
0.3953,558 co-occurrences
爸bà
0.395528 co-occurrences
穴xué
0.394408 co-occurrences
碌lù
0.39390 co-occurrences
猾huá
0.39072 co-occurrences
啃kěn
0.38642 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (2)

穷鼠啮狸qióngshǔ nièlíHSK 7+

a cornered rat will bite a cat, weak people will attack when cornered

phrase

Showing 1 of 2 idioms containing 狸.

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

狸字虽然难写，但意思很有趣。

lí zì suī rán nán xiě , dàn yì sī hěn yǒu qù .

Although the character "狸" is difficult to write, its meaning is quite interesting.

SmzdmApr 2026

皮克斯新作《河狸变身计划》争议:技术巅峰与叙事崩塌

pí kè sī xīn zuò hé lí biàn shēn jì huá zhēng yì : jì shù diān fēng yǔ xù shì bēng tā

SmzdmMar 2026

《河狸变身计划》彩蛋与皮克斯宇宙联动:值得二刷...

hé lí biàn shēn jì huá cǎi dàn yǔ pí kè sī yǔ zhòu lián dòng : zhí dé èr shuā . . .

Character Family

犭 Radical Family — Characters sharing the dog radical

狈bèi猜cāi猖chāng独dú犯fàn狗gǒu狠hěn猴hóu狐hú猾huá

Related Characters

狗gǒu猫māo猜cāi猛měng猩xīng猾huá狱yù猎liè猪zhū状zhuàng

Homophones — Characters pronounced lí

厘lí

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 狸 (lí) mean in Chinese?
狸 (lí) primarily means "raccoon dog." It is classified as HSK Level 7-9, making it an expert-level character. It ranks #3077 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 狸 and 埋?
狸 (lí) and 埋 (mái) are often confused. confusable. The key distinguishing feature: 犭 vs 土 (same 里 component).
How many strokes does 狸 have?
狸 is written with 10 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 狸?
The radical associated with 狸 is 犭 (dog). This radical appears in many characters related to dog.
What are the components of 狸?
狸 is composed of: 犭 (semantic), 里 (phonetic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰犭里 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 狸?
Common words with 狸 include: 狐狸 (hú li, "fox"); 海狸 (hǎi lí, "beaver"); 狐狸精 (hú li jīng, "fox-spirit"); 狐狸尾巴 (hú li wěi ba, "lit. fox's tail (idiom)"); 老狐狸 (lǎo hú li, "old fox"). There are over 14 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 狸 (lí)?
Several characters share the pronunciation lí: 厘 (Li (c. 2000 BC), sixth of the legendary Flame Emperors 炎帝 descended from Shennong 神農|神农 Farmer God, also known as Ai 哀). Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 狸 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 狸 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.