剃 (tì): to shave, shave, to weed

剃 (tì) is a Chinese character meaning “to shave.” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 弟 (phonetic) and 刂 (semantic). It ranks #2868 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 剃 knife. Its radical form 刂 (knife) appears in many related characters such as 分 (fēn, to divide), 别 (bié, to leave), 到 (dào, to reach).

Spoken pronunciation

Definitions

  1. to shave
  2. shave
  3. to weed

Etymology & Origin

剃

pictophoneticknife

Decomposition: ⿰弟刂 (layout: left-right)

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9

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

Words & Compounds

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
剃刀nountì dāorazor
剃须刀nountì xū dāoshaver
剃头verbtì tóuto have one's head shaved
剃度verbtì dùto take the tonsure
剃头挑子一头热tì tóu tiāo zi yī tóu rèlit. only one end of the barber's pole is hot (idiom)
剃光头verbtì guāng tóuto shave the whole head clean
剃发令tì fà lìngthe Qing order to all men to shave their heads but keep a queue, first ordered in 1646
鬼剃头nounguǐ tì tóuspot baldness (alopecia areata)
奥卡姆剃刀nounào kǎ mǔ tì dāoOccam's razor
剃发留辫tì fà liú biànto shave the head but keep the queue
剃须tì xūto shave (facial hair)
剃须膏tì xū gāoshaving cream
12
Total compounds
83
As first character
0
As last character
17
As middle character

剃 appears in 12 compound words: 83 as the first character, 0 as the last, and 17 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 剃 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

刀dāo
0.5731,663 co-occurrences
辫biàn
0.45922 co-occurrences
头tóu
0.432566 co-occurrences
掉diào
0.432258 co-occurrences
须xū
0.428229 co-occurrences
僧sēng
0.414152 co-occurrences
毛máo
0.398306 co-occurrences
光guāng
0.396792 co-occurrences
匠jiàng
0.38260 co-occurrences
勺sháo
0.36910 co-occurrences

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

剃字虽然难写,但意思很有趣。

tì zì suī rán nán xiě , dàn yì sī hěn yǒu qù .

The character "shave" is difficult to write, but its meaning is quite interesting.

少数派Jul 2026

缺点:噪音较大,用起来有点震手 优点:剃须干净,体积超小。

quē diǎn : zào yīn jiào dà , yòng qǐ lái yǒu diǎn zhèn shǒu yōu diǎn : tì xū gān jìng , tǐ jī chāo xiǎo .

Cons: It's a bit noisy and vibrates a little when in use. Pros: It provides a close shave and is extremely compact.

中国新闻网·生活Jul 2026

还有一个非常典型的表现叫“剃刀背”,就是孩子弯腰时背部一侧明显隆起。

hái yǒu yī gè fēi cháng diǎn xíng de biǎo xiàn jiào tì dāo bèi , jiù shì hái zǐ wān yāo shí bèi bù yī cè míng xiǎn lóng qǐ .

Another very common symptom is called a “razor-back,” which is when one side of a child’s back bulges noticeably when they bend over.

少数派Jul 2026

最重磅还把我的陈年老剃须刀拿出来了,整锅水立马浑浊化汤。

zuì chóng bàng hái bǎ wǒ de chén nián lǎo tì xū dāo ná chū lái le , zhěng guō shuǐ lì mǎ hún zhuó huà tāng .

To top it all off, he even pulled out my old razor, and the entire pot of water immediately turned murky.

爱范儿Jul 2026

造剃须刀时,徕芬找到的第一个差异点在电机框架上。

zào tì xū dāo shí , 徕 fēn zhǎo dào de dì yī gè chā yì diǎn zài diàn jī kuàng jià shàng .

When designing razors, Leifen identified the motor frame as the first area for differentiation.

中国新闻网·文化Jul 2026

为演好潘月亭这个角色,他主动增肥、剃光头,彻底放下“美男子”标签。

wéi yǎn hǎo pān yuè tíng zhè gè jiǎo sè , tā zhǔ dòng zēng féi , tì guāng tóu , chè de fàng xià měi nán zǐ biāo qiān .

To play the role of Pan Yue-ting convincingly, he took the initiative to gain weight and shave his head, completely shedding his “heartthrob” image.

Tatoeba

他一如往常,没有剃胡子就上班去了。

Tā yīrúwǎngcháng, méiyǒu tì húzi jiù shàngbān qù le.

As is often the case with him, he went to the office without shaving.

Tatoeba

我已经决定把我的头发剃了。

Wǒ yǐjīng juédìng bǎ wǒ de tóufa tì le.

I've decided to shave my head.

Tatoeba

剃须刀发出了嗡嗡的响声。

Tìxūdāo fāchū le wēngwēng de xiǎngshēng.

The razor made a buzzing sound.

Tatoeba

我本该在买下这个电动剃须刀之前试一下的。

Wǒ běn gāi zài mǎi xià zhège diàndòng tìxūdāo zhīqián shì yīxià de.

I should have tried out this electric shaver before buying it.

Character Family

Semantic Family — Characters sharing the 刂 (knife) component

Homophones — Characters pronounced tì

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 剃 (tì) mean in Chinese?
剃 (tì) primarily means "to shave." It is classified as HSK Level 7-9, making it an expert-level character. It ranks #2868 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 剃 and 递?
剃 (tì) and 递 (dì) are often confused. confusable. The key distinguishing feature: 刂 vs 辶 (same 弟 component).
How many strokes does 剃 have?
剃 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 剃?
The radical associated with 剃 is 刂 (knife). This radical appears in many characters related to knife.
What are the components of 剃?
剃 is composed of: 弟 (phonetic), 刂 (semantic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰弟刂 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 剃?
Common words with 剃 include: 剃刀 (tì dāo, "razor"); 剃须刀 (tì xū dāo, "shaver"); 剃头 (tì tóu, "to have one's head shaved"); 剃度 (tì dù, "to take the tonsure"); 剃头挑子一头热 (tì tóu tiāo zi yī tóu rè, "lit. only one end of the barber's pole is hot (idiom)"). There are over 12 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 剃 (tì)?
Several characters share the pronunciation tì: 梯 (ladder, stairs), 涕 (tears), 体 (body), 提 (to lift, to mention), and 5 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 剃 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 剃 is written the same way in both simplified and traditional Chinese.

Practice writing 剃 with real-time feedback

Trace stroke sequences, hear spoken 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.