(shuāi): to throw down, to fall, to drop and break

(shuāi) is a Chinese character meaning “to throw down.” Classified as HSK Level 5 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of (semantic) and (phonetic). It ranks #2214 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, hand. Its radical form (hand) appears in many related characters such as (shǒu, hand), (, hit, make), (zhǎo, to look for).

Native pronunciation

Definitions

  1. to throw down
  2. to fall
  3. to drop and break

Etymology & Origin

pictophonetichand

Decomposition: ⿰扌率 (layout: left-right)

Stroke Order

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

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

Words & Compounds

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
shuāi dǎoto fall down
shuāi jiāoto trip and fall
shuāi jiāovariant of 摔跤[shuai1 jiao1]
shuāi gēn touto fall
shuāi dato knock
shuāi sǐto fall to one's death
guò jiān shuāi(judo) shoulder throw
shuāi duànto break (e.g. bones) in a fall
pò wǎn pò shuāilit. to smash a cracked pot
shuāi shāngto injure oneself in a fall
shuāi pòto fall and smash into pieces
jiǎ shuāi(soccer) diving
pò guàn pò shuāilit. to smash a pot just because it has a crack (idiom)
shuāi jiǎoto wrestle
shuāi huàito drop and break
17
Total compounds
71
As first character
29
As last character
0
As middle character

appears in 17 compound words: 71 as the first character, 29 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 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

jiāo
0.87623,562 co-occurrences
jiǎo
0.54828,326 co-occurrences
dǎo
0.5398,092 co-occurrences
0.51210 co-occurrences
kuáng
0.4933,264 co-occurrences
shǒu
0.43112,354 co-occurrences
tuǐ
0.409756 co-occurrences
0.406618 co-occurrences
shèn
0.405834 co-occurrences
0.4001,104 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (1)

pò guàn pò shuāiHSK 6+

to allow things to worsen even if you know there are faults or mistakes

phrase

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

照镜子,整理一下自己的仪容。

shuāi zhào jìng zǐ , zhěng lǐ yī xià zì jǐ de yí róng .

Look in the mirror and fix your appearance.

中時新聞網Feb 2026

毒驾男自躲超商!见警瞎问“这警车谁的” 下秒遭大...

dú jià nán zì shuāi duǒ chāo shāng ! jiàn jǐng xiā wèn zhè jǐng chē shéi de xià miǎo zāo dà . . .

The drug driver man fell and hid in the supermarket! Seeing the police, he asked "who is this police car" and was hit by a big one in the next second...

WorldjournalFeb 2026

福建女孩扶起骑车倒老人 遭索赔人民币22万缠讼近1年

fú jiàn nǚ hái fú qǐ qí chē shuāi dǎo lǎo rén zāo suǒ péi rén mín bì 2 2 wàn chán sòng jìn 1 nián

Fujian girl helped up and fell on a bicycle and fell down an old man and was sued for nearly 1 year with a claim of RMB 220,000

東森新聞Feb 2026

8岁男骑车游南横 撞护栏抛飞溪底亡

8 suì nán qí chē yóu nán héng zhuàng hù lán pāo fēi shuāi xī de wáng

An 8-year-old male rode a bicycle to the south and crashed into a guardrail and fell to the bottom of the stream and died

公視新聞網 PnnFeb 2026

机车擦撞南横瓦筏哈桥护栏 骑士落送医仍不治

jī chē cā zhuàng nán héng wǎ 筏 hā qiáo hù lán qí shì shuāi luò sòng yī réng bù zhì

The locomotive collided with the guardrail of the Ha Bridge on the South Hengwa Raft, and the rider fell and was sent to the hospital and still died

UdnnewsindexFeb 2026

6旬骑士游南横公路自撞护栏 50米边坡丧命...撞击瞬间曝光

6 xún qí shì yóu nán héng gōng lù zì zhuàng hù lán shuāi 5 0 mǐ biān pō sāng mìng . . . zhuàng jī shùn jiān pù guāng

A 60-year-old knight traveled to Nanheng Highway and crashed into a guardrail and fell 50 meters down the slope and died... The impact was instantaneously exposed

Tatoeba

约翰和汤姆在角。

Yuēhàn hé Tāngmǔ zài shuāijiǎo.

John is wrestling with Tom.

Tatoeba

汤姆失去了平衡落下来。

Tāngmǔ shīqù le pínghéng shuāi luò xiàlái.

Tom lost his balance and fell down.

Tatoeba

坏过你的眼镜吗?

Nǐ shuāihuài guo nǐ de yǎnjìng ma?

Have you ever broken your glasses?

Tatoeba

谁告诉你们汤姆把腿断的?

Shéi gàosu nǐmen Tāngmǔ bǎ tuǐ shuāiduàn de?

Who told you Tom broke his leg?

Character Family

Homophones — Characters pronounced shuāi

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 摔 (shuāi) mean in Chinese?
摔 (shuāi) primarily means "to throw down." It is classified as HSK Level 5, making it an advanced character. It ranks #2214 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 摔 and 设?
摔 (shuāi) and 设 (shè) are often confused. antonym. The key distinguishing feature: 摔 (down) vs 设 (up).
How many strokes does 摔 have?
摔 is written with 14 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 摔?
The radical associated with 摔 is 扌 (hand). This radical appears in many characters related to hand.
What are the components of 摔?
摔 is composed of: 扌 (semantic), 率 (phonetic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰扌率 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 摔?
Common words with 摔 include: 摔倒 (shuāi dǎo, "to fall down"); 摔跤 (shuāi jiāo, "to trip and fall"); 摔交 (shuāi jiāo, "variant of 摔跤[shuai1 jiao1]"); 摔跟头 (shuāi gēn tou, "to fall"); 摔打 (shuāi da, "to knock"). There are over 17 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 摔 (shuāi)?
Several characters share the pronunciation shuāi: 甩 (to throw), 帅 ((bound form) commander-in-chief). Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 摔 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 摔 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.