忙 (máng): busy

忙 (máng) is a Chinese character meaning “busy.” Classified as HSK Level 1 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 忄 (structural) and 亡 (structural). It ranks #827 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 忙 a heart 忄 faced with death 亡; 亡 also provides the pronunciation. Its radical form 忄 (heart) appears in many related characters such as 快 (kuài, fast, happy), 怎 (zěn, how), 息 (xī, breath).

Spoken pronunciation

Definitions

  1. busy

Etymology & Origin

忙

ideographicA heart 忄 faced with death 亡; 亡 also provides the pronunciation

Decomposition: ⿰忄亡 (layout: left-right)

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6

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

Words & Compounds

HSK Vocabulary with 忙

WordPinyinMeaningHSK
帮忙verbbāng mángto help2
匆忙adjectivecōng mánghasty6
忙碌adjectivemáng lùbusy5
繁忙adjectivefán mángbusy6
急忙adverbjí mánghastily5
赶忙adverbgǎn mángto hurry6
连忙adverblián mángpromptly5

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
忙于verbmáng yúbusy with
忙活nounmáng huoto be really busy
帮倒忙verbbāng dào mángto be more of a hindrance than a help
大忙人noundà máng rénbusy bee
手忙脚乱phraseshǒu máng jiǎo luàn(idiom) to act with confusion or in a disorderly manner
急急忙忙jí jí máng mánghurriedly
忙乱adjectivemáng luànrushed and muddled
奔忙verbbēn mángto be busy rushing about
不慌不忙bù huāng bù máng(idiom) calm
忙音nounmáng yīnbusy signal (telephony)
忙乎nounmáng hūto be busy (colloquial)
慌忙adjectivehuāng mángin a great rush
忙里偷闲máng lǐ tōu xián(idiom) to snatch a moment of leisure in the midst of a busy schedule
忙不迭adverbmáng bù diéhurriedly
农忙nounnóng máng(agriculture) busy season
37
Total compounds
38
As first character
51
As last character
11
As middle character

忙 appears in 37 compound words: 38 as the first character, 51 as the last, and 11 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 忙 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

碌lù
0.6762,461 co-occurrences
匆cōng
0.6632,502 co-occurrences
繁fán
0.64421,846 co-occurrences
帮bāng
0.5393,008 co-occurrences
慌huāng
0.512742 co-occurrences
急jí
0.4652,784 co-occurrences
午wǔ
0.4352,262 co-occurrences
惕tì
0.402118 co-occurrences
赶gǎn
0.402326 co-occurrences
早zǎo
0.3992,640 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (8)

不慌不忙bù huāng bù mángHSK 7+

(idiom) calm; unhurried; composed

phrase
急急忙忙jí jí máng mángHSK 3+

hurriedly

phrase
忙不过来máng bù guò láiHSK 2+

to have more work than one can deal with; to have one's hands full

phrase
忙里偷闲máng lǐ tōu xiánHSK 6+

(idiom) to snatch a moment of leisure in the midst of a busy schedule

phrase
忙忙叨叨máng mang dāo dāoHSK 7+

in a busy and hasty manner

phrase
忙中有错máng zhōng yǒu cuòHSK 2+

rushed work leads to errors (idiom)

phrase
手忙脚乱shǒumángjiǎoluànHSK 4+

to act in a disorderly and flustered manner

phrase
越帮越忙yuèbāngyuèmángHSK 3+

to make things worse instead of helping someone

phrase

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

最近工作很忙,每天都要加班到很晚。

Zuìjìn gōngzuò hěn máng, měitiān dōu yào jiābān dào hěn wǎn.

Work has been very busy lately; I have to work overtime until very late every day.

中国新闻网_梳理天下新闻Feb 2026

河南偃师:新材料企业生产忙

hé nán 偃 shī : xīn cái liào qǐ yè shēng chǎn máng

Yanshi, Henan: New material enterprises are busy with production

InvestingFeb 2026

...亿元锁定上游资产100%股权,重要股东却忙减持

. . . yì yuán suǒ dìng shàng yóu zī chǎn 1 0 0 gǔ quán , chóng yāo gǔ dōng què máng jiǎn chí

... 100 million yuan locked 100% of the equity of upstream assets, but important shareholders were busy reducing their holdings

EttodayFeb 2026

黄腾浩退居幕后“忙搬桌椅”! 角头团队新作怀秋、吴念轩双帅...

huáng téng hào tuì jū mù hòu máng bān zhuō yǐ ! jiǎo tóu tuán duì xīn zuò huái qiū , wú niàn 轩 shuāng shuài . . .

Huang Tenghao retreated behind the scenes to "busy moving tables and chairs"! The new work of the Jiaotou team is Huai Qiu and Wu Nianxuan...

经济观察网-首页Feb 2026

“涨价”策略失灵叠加“黑天鹅”事件,雀巢忙“瘦身”自救

zhǎng jià cè lüè shī líng dié jiā hēi tiān é shì jiàn , qiāo cháo máng shòu shēn zì jiù

The failure of the "price increase" strategy superimposed on the "black swan" incident, Nestlé was busy "slimming" to save itself

百度新闻Feb 2026

这个春节,“成都造”机器人上岗忙

zhè gě chūn jié , chéng dū zào jī qì rén shǎng gāng máng

This Spring Festival, "Chengdu-made" robots are busy on duty

Tatoeba

你可以帮忙找找吗?

Nǐ kěyǐ bāngmáng zhǎo zhǎo ma?

Could you help me to find it?

Tatoeba

可以帮忙关上窗子吗?

Kěyǐ bāngmáng guānshàng chuāngzi ma?

Close the window, will you?

Tatoeba

我能帮你什么忙吗?

Wǒ néng bāng nǐ shénme máng ma?

Can I be of any service to you?

Tatoeba

你的朋友近来在忙些什么?

Nǐ de péngyou jìnlái zài máng xiē shénme?

What has your friend been doing recently?

Character Family

Homophones — Characters pronounced máng

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 忙 (máng) mean in Chinese?
忙 (máng) primarily means "busy." It is classified as HSK Level 1, making it a beginner-level character. It ranks #827 in character frequency.
How many strokes does 忙 have?
忙 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 忙?
The radical associated with 忙 is 忄 (heart). This radical appears in many characters related to heart.
What are the components of 忙?
忙 is composed of: 忄 (structural), 亡 (structural). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰忄亡 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 忙?
Common words with 忙 include: 帮忙 (bāng máng, "to help"); 匆忙 (cōng máng, "hasty"); 忙碌 (máng lù, "busy"); 忙于 (máng yú, "busy with"); 忙活 (máng huo, "to be really busy"). There are over 37 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 忙 (máng)?
Several characters share the pronunciation máng: 茫 (vast, with no clear boundary), 盲 (blind), 芒 (awn (of cereals)), 莽 ((bound form) dense growth of grass), and 1 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 忙 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 忙 is written the same way in both simplified and traditional Chinese.

Practice writing 忙 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.