烁 (shuò): bright, luminous

烁 (shuò) is a Chinese character meaning “bright.” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 火 (structural) and 乐 (structural). It ranks #2566 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 烁 the happy 乐 light of a flame 火. Its radical form 火 (fire) appears in many related characters such as 火 (huǒ, fire), 灯 (dēng, lamp, light), 烟 (yān, smoke).

Native pronunciation
HSK 7-9Radical: 火 fire9 strokesFrequency #2566火 structural乐 structural

Definitions

  1. bright
  2. luminous

Etymology & Origin

烁

ideographicThe happy 乐 light of a flame 火

Decomposition: ⿰火乐 (layout: left-right)

Components:火structural乐structural

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9

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

Words & Compounds

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
闪烁shǎn shuòto glisten
金光闪烁jīn guāng shǎn shuòspangle
震古烁今zhèn gǔ shuò jīnlit. to astonish the ancients and dazzle contemporaries (idiom)
闪烁其词shǎn shuò qí cíto speak evasively (idiom)
闪烁体shǎn shuò tǐ(physics) scintillator
熠烁yì shuòto twinkle
烁烁shuò shuòflickering
7
Total compounds
14
As first character
43
As last character
43
As middle character

烁 appears in 7 compound words: 14 as the first character, 43 as the last, and 43 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 烁 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

闪shǎn
0.7794,288 co-occurrences
灯dēng
0.492366 co-occurrences
光guāng
0.379744 co-occurrences
芒máng
0.36972 co-occurrences
杨yáng
0.364162 co-occurrences
睛jīng
0.35648 co-occurrences
体tǐ
0.350516 co-occurrences
着zhe
0.350276 co-occurrences
噪zào
0.34930 co-occurrences
液yè
0.33690 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (2)

闪烁其词shǎnshuòqícíHSK 7+

to speak evasively; to hedge; to beat around the bush

phrase
震古烁今zhèngǔshuòjīnHSK 7+

surpassing the ancients and amazing the contemporaries; earthshaking; splendid

phrase

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

篝火晚会上，大家手拉手围着烁堆跳舞。

篝 huǒ wǎn huì shǎng , dà jiā shǒu lā shǒu wéi zhe shuò duī tiào wǔ .

At the bonfire party, everyone danced hand in hand around the blazing fire.

東方日報Apr 2026

【混合过关】兆文:火焰闪烁赢草闸吸引

hùn gě guò guān zhào wén : huǒ yàn shǎn shuò yíng cǎo zhá xī yǐn

SmzdmMar 2026

【开箱】摩动核 星烁级 迅勇级 项羽 #拼装模型 #摩动核 ...

kāi xiāng mó dòng hé xīng shuò jí xùn yǒng jí xiàng yǔ pīn zhuāng mó xíng mó dòng hé . . .

[Unboxing] MoDongHe: Star Shard Class, Swift Warrior Class – Xiang Yu #ModelKit #MoDongHe ...

Tatoeba

她的眼睛闪烁着喜悦的光芒。

Tā de yǎnjing shǎnshuò zhe xǐyuè de guāngmáng.

Her eyes were shining with joy.

Tatoeba

无数星星在天上闪烁。

Wúshù xīngxing zài tiānshàng shǎnshuò.

Countless stars were twinkling in the sky.

Tatoeba

当她看到妈妈没在生她的气，她的双眼因为幸福而闪烁了。

Dāng tā kàn dào māma méi zài shēng tā de qì, tā de shuāngyǎn yīnwèi xìngfú ér shǎnshuò le.

Her eyes shone with joy when she saw that her mother was not mad at her.

Character Family

火 Radical Family — Characters sharing the fire radical

灯dēng烦fán灰huī火huǒ烂làn炼liàn燃rán烧shāo烟yān灾zāi

Related Characters

火huǒ灯dēng烟yān烦fán炼liàn烧shāo燃rán灰huī灾zāi烂làn

Homophones — Characters pronounced shuò

说shuō硕shuò

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 烁 (shuò) mean in Chinese?
烁 (shuò) primarily means "bright." It is classified as HSK Level 7-9, making it an expert-level character. It ranks #2566 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 烁 and 暧?
烁 (shuò) and 暧 (ài) are often confused. antonym. The key distinguishing feature: 烁 (bright) vs 暧 (dim).
How many strokes does 烁 have?
烁 is written with 9 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 烁?
The radical associated with 烁 is 火 (fire). This radical appears in many characters related to fire.
What are the components of 烁?
烁 is composed of: 火 (structural), 乐 (structural). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰火乐 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 烁?
Common words with 烁 include: 闪烁 (shǎn shuò, "to glisten"); 金光闪烁 (jīn guāng shǎn shuò, "spangle"); 震古烁今 (zhèn gǔ shuò jīn, "lit. to astonish the ancients and dazzle contemporaries (idiom)"); 闪烁其词 (shǎn shuò qí cí, "to speak evasively (idiom)"); 闪烁体 (shǎn shuò tǐ, "(physics) scintillator"). There are over 7 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 烁 (shuò)?
Several characters share the pronunciation shuò: 说 (to speak, to say), 硕 ((bound form) large). Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 烁 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 烁 is written the same way in both simplified and traditional Chinese.

Practice writing 烁 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.