(máng): busy

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

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

Native pronunciation

Definitions

  1. busy

Etymology & Origin

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

Words & Compounds

HSK Vocabulary with

WordPinyinMeaningHSK
verbbāng mángto help2
adjectivecōng mánghasty6
adjectivemáng lùbusy5
fán mángbusy6
adverbjí mánghastily5
adverbgǎn mángto hurry6
adverblián mángpromptly5

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
máng yúbusy with
máng huoto be really busy
bāng dào mángto be more of a hindrance than a help
dà máng rénbusy bee
shǒu máng jiǎo luàn(idiom) to act with confusion or in a disorderly manner
jí jí máng mánghurriedly
máng luànrushed and muddled
bēn mángto be busy rushing about
bù huāng bù máng(idiom) calm
máng yīnbusy signal (telephony)
máng hūto be busy (colloquial)
huāng mángin a great rush
máng bù diéhurriedly
nóng máng(agriculture) busy season
máng bù guò láito have more work than one can deal with
36
Total compounds
36
As first character
53
As last character
11
As middle character

appears in 36 compound words: 36 as the first character, 53 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 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

fán
0.74065,496 co-occurrences
0.7097,353 co-occurrences
cōng
0.6887,473 co-occurrences
bāng
0.5398,844 co-occurrences
huāng
0.5202,226 co-occurrences
0.4658,363 co-occurrences
0.4416,786 co-occurrences
0.408354 co-occurrences
zǎo
0.4057,920 co-occurrences
gǎn
0.402984 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (7)

bù huāng bù mángHSK 7+

(idiom) calm; unhurried; composed

phrase
jí jí máng mángHSK 3+

hurriedly

phrase
máng bù guò láiHSK 2+

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

phrase
máng mang dāo dāoHSK 7+

in a busy and hasty manner

phrase
máng zhōng yǒu cuòHSK 2+

rushed work leads to errors (idiom)

phrase
shǒumángjiǎoluànHSK 4+

to act in a disorderly and flustered manner

phrase
yuèbāngyuèmángHSK 3+

to make things worse instead of helping someone

phrase

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

最近工作很,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

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“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“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

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

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

Tatoeba

你可以帮找找吗?

Nǐ kěyǐ bāngmáng zhǎo zhǎo ma?

Could you help me to find it?

Tatoeba

可以帮关上窗子吗?

Kěyǐ bāngmáng guānshàng chuāngzi ma?

Close the window, will you?

Tatoeba

我能帮你什么吗?

Wǒ néng bāng nǐ shénme máng ma?

Can I be of any service to you?

Tatoeba

你的朋友近来在些什么?

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 36 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 忙 (máng)?
Several characters share the pronunciation máng: 芒 (awn (of cereals)), 盲 (blind), 茫 (vast, with no clear boundary), 莽 ((bound form) dense growth of grass). 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 with real-time feedback

Trace stroke sequences, hear native 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.