臊 (sāo): to smell of urine (or sweat etc), shame, bashfulness

臊 (sāo) is a Chinese character meaning “to smell of urine (or sweat etc).” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of ⺼ (semantic) and 喿 (phonetic). It ranks #2993 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 臊 flesh. Its radical form 肉 (meat) appears in many related characters such as 肉 (ròu, meat), 能 (néng, can), 背 (bèi, the back of a body or object).

Spoken pronunciation
HSK 7-9Radical: 肉 meat17 strokesFrequency #2993⺼ semantic喿 phonetic

Definitions

  1. to smell of urine (or sweat etc)
  2. shame
  3. bashfulness

Etymology & Origin

臊

pictophoneticflesh

Decomposition: ⿰⺼喿 (layout: left-right)

Components:⺼semantic喿phonetic

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17

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

Words & Compounds

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
害臊verbhài sàoto be bashful
没羞没臊méi xiū méi sàoshameless
臊子nounsào zi(dialect) minced or diced meat (as part of a dish)
臊气nounsāo qìfoul smell
臊眉耷眼sào méi dā yǎn(dialect) ashamed
臊腥sāo xīngstench
6
Total compounds
67
As first character
33
As last character
0
As middle character

臊 appears in 6 compound words: 67 as the first character, 33 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 臊 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

肉ròu
0.48486 co-occurrences
腥xīng
0.47412 co-occurrences
臭chòu
0.44612 co-occurrences
害hài
0.41660 co-occurrences
狐hú
0.40210 co-occurrences
味wèi
0.34312 co-occurrences
子zǐ
0.336110 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (1)

没羞没臊méi xiū méi sàoHSK 7+

shameless

phrase

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

臊字在日常生活中使用频率较低。

sāo zì zài rì cháng shēng huó zhōng shǐ yòng pín lǜ jiào dī .

The character "臊" is not commonly used in everyday life.

中国新闻网·文化Sep 2026

节目组供图 蒿籽面的灵魂不只在面，更在臊子和酸汤。

jié mù zǔ gōng tú 蒿 zǐ miàn de líng hún bù zhī zài miàn , gēng zài sāo zǐ hé suān tāng .

Photo courtesy of the production team. The essence of mugwort noodles lies not only in the noodles themselves, but also in the meat sauce and sour broth.

Tatoeba

我们没理由害臊。

Wǒmen méi lǐyóu hàisào.

We have no reason to be ashamed.

Character Family

Semantic Family — Characters sharing the ⺼ (flesh) component

脑nǎo脸liǎn股gǔ背bèi脚jiǎo胜shèng胡hú脱tuō胆dǎn胞bāo

Related Characters

肉ròu能néng背bèi胜shèng胸xiōng脱tuō腐fǔ肩jiān胡hú胶jiāo

Homophones — Characters pronounced sāo

扫sǎo骚sāo嫂sǎo

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 臊 (sāo) mean in Chinese?
臊 (sāo) primarily means "to smell of urine (or sweat etc)." It is classified as HSK Level 7-9, making it an expert-level character. It ranks #2993 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 臊 and 操?
臊 (sāo) and 操 (cāo) are often confused. confusable. The key distinguishing feature: 肉 vs 扌 (same 喿 component).
How many strokes does 臊 have?
臊 is written with 17 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 臊?
The radical associated with 臊 is 肉 (meat). This radical appears in many characters related to meat.
What are the components of 臊?
臊 is composed of: ⺼ (semantic), 喿 (phonetic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰⺼喿 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 臊?
Common words with 臊 include: 害臊 (hài sào, "to be bashful"); 没羞没臊 (méi xiū méi sào, "shameless"); 臊子 (sào zi, "(dialect) minced or diced meat (as part of a dish)"); 臊气 (sāo qì, "foul smell"); 臊眉耷眼 (sào méi dā yǎn, "(dialect) ashamed"). There are over 6 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 臊 (sāo)?
Several characters share the pronunciation sāo: 扫 (to sweep (with a brush or broom)), 骚 (disturb, coquettish), 嫂 ((bound form) older brother's wife). Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 臊 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 臊 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.