甥 (shēng): (bound form) sister's son, nephew

甥 (shēng) is a Chinese character meaning “(bound form) sister's son.” Classified as HSK Level 6 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 生 (phonetic) and 男 (semantic). It ranks #3082 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 甥 boy. Its radical form 生 (life) appears in many related characters such as 生 (shēng, to be born).

Native pronunciation
HSK 6Radical: 生 life12 strokesFrequency #3082生 phonetic男 semantic

Definitions

  1. (bound form) sister's son
  2. nephew

Etymology & Origin

甥

pictophoneticboy

Decomposition: ⿰生男 (layout: left-right)

Components:生phonetic男semantic

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12

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

Words & Compounds

HSK Vocabulary with 甥

WordPinyinMeaningHSK
外甥nounwài shēngsister's son6

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
外甥女wài sheng nǚsister's daughter
甥女shēng nǚsister's daughter
外甥女婿wài sheng nǚ xusister's daughter's husband
外甥媳妇wài sheng xí fùsister's son's wife
5
Total compounds
20
As first character
20
As last character
60
As middle character

甥 appears in 5 compound words: 20 as the first character, 20 as the last, and 60 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 甥 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

姨yí
0.6182,718 co-occurrences
外wài
0.53025,848 co-occurrences
舅jiù
0.5281,182 co-occurrences
婿xù
0.490648 co-occurrences
媳xí
0.469396 co-occurrences
侄zhí
0.455564 co-occurrences
女nǚ
0.4469,234 co-occurrences
孙sūn
0.360558 co-occurrences
之zhī
0.3515,874 co-occurrences
养yǎng
0.313234 co-occurrences

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

写好甥字需要掌握正确的笔画顺序。

xiě hǎo shēng zì xū yāo zhǎng wò zhèng què de bǐ huà shùn xù .

To write the character "甥" correctly, you need to master the correct stroke order.

UdnnewsindexFeb 2026

刘世芳外甥颜文群任职公司 陆补助逾1800万人民币

liú shì fāng wài shēng yán wén qún rèn zhí gōng sī lù bǔ zhù yú 1 8 0 0 wàn rén mín bì

Liu Shifang's nephew Yan Wenqun worked for the company and subsidized more than 18 million yuan

UdnnewsindexFeb 2026

港媒爆料 刘世芳收台商外甥政治献金

gǎng méi bào liào liú shì fāng shōu tái shāng wài shēng zhèng zhì xiàn jīn

Hong Kong media broke the news that Liu Shifang received political donations from Taiwanese businessmen's nephews

三立新聞網Feb 2026

国台办喊查刘世芳外甥 陆委会发声谴责

guó tái bàn hǎn chá liú shì fāng wài shēng lù wěi huì fā shēng qiǎn zé

The Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council shouted to investigate Liu Shifang's nephew and the Mainland Affairs Council spoke out to condemn it

TvbsFeb 2026

刘世芳遭港媒爆外甥在中国“赚红钱” 陆委会:赤裸裸跨境镇压

liú shì fāng zāo gǎng méi bào wài shēng zài zhōng guó zhuàn hóng qián lù wěi huì : chì luǒ luǒ kuà jìng zhèn yā

Liu Shifang was exposed by Hong Kong media as his nephew "making red money" in China Mainland Affairs Council: Naked cross-border suppression

Character Family

生 Radical Family — Characters sharing the life radical

舅jiù生shēng

Related Characters

生shēng

Homophones — Characters pronounced shēng

牲shēng

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 甥 (shēng) mean in Chinese?
甥 (shēng) primarily means "(bound form) sister's son." It is classified as HSK Level 6, making it an advanced character. It ranks #3082 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 甥 and 性?
甥 (shēng) and 性 (xìng) are often confused. confusable. The key distinguishing feature: 生 vs 忄 (same 生 component).
How many strokes does 甥 have?
甥 is written with 12 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 甥?
The radical associated with 甥 is 生 (life). This radical appears in many characters related to life.
What are the components of 甥?
甥 is composed of: 生 (phonetic), 男 (semantic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰生男 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 甥?
Common words with 甥 include: 外甥 (wài shēng, "sister's son"); 外甥女 (wài sheng nǚ, "sister's daughter"); 甥女 (shēng nǚ, "sister's daughter"); 外甥女婿 (wài sheng nǚ xu, "sister's daughter's husband"); 外甥媳妇 (wài sheng xí fù, "sister's son's wife"). There are over 5 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 甥 (shēng)?
Several characters share the pronunciation shēng: 牲 (domestic animal). Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 甥 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 甥 is written the same way in both simplified and traditional Chinese.

Practice writing 甥 with real-time feedback

Trace stroke sequences, hear native pronunciation, and build lasting retention with spaced repetition in the HanziFeed app.

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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.