沏 (qī): to steep (tea)

沏 (qī) is a Chinese character meaning “to steep (tea).” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 氵 (semantic) and 切 (phonetic). It ranks #2996 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 沏 water. Its radical form 氵 (water) appears in many related characters such as 水 (shuǐ, water), 汉 (hàn, Han ethnic group), 汽 (qì, steam).

Spoken pronunciation
HSK 7-9Radical: 氵 water7 strokesFrequency #2996氵 semantic切 phonetic

Definitions

  1. to steep (tea)

Etymology & Origin

沏

pictophoneticwater

Decomposition: ⿰氵切 (layout: left-right)

Components:氵semantic切phonetic

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7

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

Words & Compounds

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
沏茶qī cháto make tea
1
Total compounds
100
As first character
0
As last character
0
As middle character

沏 appears in 1 compound words: 100 as the first character, 0 as the last, and 0 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 沏 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

茶chá
0.51054 co-occurrences
泡pào
0.48022 co-occurrences
咖kā
0.44314 co-occurrences
水shuǐ
0.30118 co-occurrences

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

清晨的沏面波光粼粼，倒映着岸边的柳树。

qīng chén de qī miàn bō guāng 粼 粼 , dǎo yìng zhe àn biān de liǔ shù .

The rippling surface of the morning river glistened, reflecting the willow trees along the shore.

Tatoeba

母亲给我们沏茶。

Mǔqīn gěi wǒmen qī chá.

Mother is making tea for us.

Tatoeba

他们烧水想沏茶。

Tāmen shāoshuǐ xiǎng qī chá.

They boil water for tea.

Character Family

Semantic Family — Characters sharing the 氵 (water) component

没méi活huó海hǎi清qīng消xiāo流liú满mǎn注zhù激jī洛luò

Related Characters

水shuǐ汉hàn汽qì没méi洗xǐ渴kě永yǒng求qiú河hé油yóu

Homophones — Characters pronounced qī

起qǐ其qí气qì期qī器qì七qī妻qī汽qì齐qí

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 沏 (qī) mean in Chinese?
沏 (qī) primarily means "to steep (tea)." It is classified as HSK Level 7-9, making it an expert-level character. It ranks #2996 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 沏 and 窃?
沏 (qī) and 窃 (qiè) are often confused. confusable. The key distinguishing feature: 氵 vs 穴 (same 切 component).
How many strokes does 沏 have?
沏 is written with 7 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 沏?
The radical associated with 沏 is 氵 (water). This radical appears in many characters related to water.
What are the components of 沏?
沏 is composed of: 氵 (semantic), 切 (phonetic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰氵切 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 沏?
Common words with 沏 include: 沏茶 (qī chá, "to make tea"). There are over 1 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 沏 (qī)?
Several characters share the pronunciation qī: 起 (to rise), 其 (his), 气 (gas), 期 (period, expect), and 5 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 沏 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 沏 is written the same way in both simplified and traditional Chinese.

Practice writing 沏 with real-time feedback

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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.