赡 (shàn): to support

赡 (shàn) is a Chinese character meaning “to support.” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 贝 (semantic) and 詹 (phonetic). It ranks #2976 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 赡 money. Its radical form 贝 (shell) appears in many related characters such as 贵 (guì, abbr. for Guizhou Province 貴州|贵州[Gui4 zhou1]), 负 (fù, to bear), 责 (zé, responsibility).

Native pronunciation
HSK 7-9Radical: 贝 shell15 strokesFrequency #2976贝 semantic詹 phonetic

Definitions

  1. to support

Etymology & Origin

赡

pictophoneticmoney

Decomposition: ⿰贝詹 (layout: left-right)

Components:贝semantic詹phonetic

Stroke Order

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

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

Words & Compounds

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
赡养费shàn yǎng fèialimony
赡养shàn yǎngto support
南赡部洲nán shàn bù zhōuJambudvipa
3
Total compounds
67
As first character
0
As last character
33
As middle character

赡 appears in 3 compound words: 67 as the first character, 0 as the last, and 33 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 赡 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

养yǎng
0.5961,892 co-occurrences
恤xù
0.43560 co-occurrences
费fèi
0.426383 co-occurrences
仁rén
0.419426 co-occurrences
刘liú
0.405300 co-occurrences
坟fén
0.39130 co-occurrences
渊yuān
0.38942 co-occurrences
贫pín
0.36242 co-occurrences
粮liáng
0.36148 co-occurrences
藻zǎo
0.36136 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (1)

南赡部洲nán shàn bù zhōuHSK 7+

Jambudvipa

phrase

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

子女有赡养父母的义务，这是法律规定的。

Zǐnǚ yǒu shànyǎng fùmǔ de yìwù, zhè shì fǎlǜ guīdìng de.

Children have the obligation to support their parents; this is stipulated by law.

NewsFeb 2026

...内出轨!男星离婚8年遭毁灭踢爆“弃儿拒付赡养费”恶行

. . . nèi chū guǐ ! nán xīng lí hūn nián zāo huǐ miè tī bào qì ér jù fù shàn yǎng fèi è háng

... Internal cheating! The male star was divorced for 8 years and was destroyed, kicking out the evil deeds of "abandoned children refusing to pay alimony"

Tatoeba

等父母老了，我会赡养他们。

Děng fùmǔ lǎo le, wǒ huì shànyǎng tāmen.

When my parents get old, I will support them.

Tatoeba

汤姆有家属需要赡养。

Tāngmǔ yǒu jiāshǔ xūyào shànyǎng.

Tom has dependents.

Character Family

贝 Radical Family — Characters sharing the shell radical

财cái赐cì贷dài赌dǔ贩fàn费fèi贡gòng购gòu贯guàn贵guì

Related Characters

贵guì负fù责zé费fèi资zī赢yíng贝bèi财cái败bài货huò

Homophones — Characters pronounced shàn

山shān删shān衫shān煽shān闪shǎn扇shān善shàn擅shàn

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 赡 (shàn) mean in Chinese?
赡 (shàn) primarily means "to support." It is classified as HSK Level 7-9, making it an expert-level character. It ranks #2976 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 赡 and 瞻?
赡 (shàn) and 瞻 (zhān) are often confused. confusable. The key distinguishing feature: 贝 vs 目 (same 詹 component).
How many strokes does 赡 have?
赡 is written with 15 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 赡?
The radical associated with 赡 is 贝 (shell). This radical appears in many characters related to shell.
What are the components of 赡?
赡 is composed of: 贝 (semantic), 詹 (phonetic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰贝詹 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 赡?
Common words with 赡 include: 赡养费 (shàn yǎng fèi, "alimony"); 赡养 (shàn yǎng, "to support"); 南赡部洲 (nán shàn bù zhōu, "Jambudvipa"). There are over 3 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 赡 (shàn)?
Several characters share the pronunciation shàn: 山 (mountain), 删 (to delete), 衫 (shirt), 煽 (to fan into a flame), and 4 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 赡 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
No. The simplified form is 赡 and the traditional form is 贍.

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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.