(wěi): false, fake, forged

(wěi) is a Chinese character meaning “false.” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of (semantic) and (phonetic). It ranks #1546 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, is a compound character. Its radical form (person) appears in many related characters such as (rén, person), (shén, what), (jīn, now).

Native pronunciation

Definitions

  1. false
  2. fake
  3. forged

Etymology & Origin

pictophoneticThis character is a compound form.

Decomposition: ⿰亻为 (layout: left-right)

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6

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
wěi zhuāngto pretend to be (asleep etc)
wěi zàoto forge
xū wěifalse
wěi jūn zǐhypocrite
wěi zhèngperjury
wěi shànhypocritical
wěi chāocounterfeit currency
zhēn wěitrue or bogus
wěi kē xuépseudoscience
wěi zào pǐncounterfeit object
fáng wěito prevent counterfeiting
wěi lièinferior
jiǎ mào wěi liècheap quality counterfeit (goods)
wěi mìng tífalse proposition
wěi zào zhěforger
34
Total compounds
76
As first character
15
As last character
9
As middle character

appears in 34 compound words: 76 as the first character, 15 as the last, and 9 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.

zhuāng
0.52611,667 co-occurrences
0.5193,166 co-occurrences
0.495876 co-occurrences
zào
0.47815,390 co-occurrences
chāo
0.441384 co-occurrences
zhèng
0.4403,858 co-occurrences
zhà
0.430426 co-occurrences
wāng
0.4301,326 co-occurrences
mǎn
0.4272,616 co-occurrences
è
0.426234 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (2)

jiǎmàowěilièHSK 7+

fake, forged, counterfeit and poor-quality; counterfeit and shoddy (generally speaking)

phrase

Showing 1 of 2 idioms containing .

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

长得很美,心地也很善良。

tā wěi cháng dé hěn měi , xīn dì yě hěn shàn liáng .

She is exceptionally beautiful and has a kind heart.

UdnnewsindexFeb 2026

海巡:中国海警扰金门并造影片 典型认知作战

hǎi xún : zhōng guó hǎi jǐng rǎo jīn mén bìng wěi zào yǐng piàn diǎn xíng rèn zhī zuò zhàn

Coast Guard: The Chinese Coast Guard harassed Kinmen and forged videos Typical cognitive warfare

UdnnewsindexFeb 2026

引爆猪瘟 猪农父子涉造文书被诉

yǐn bào zhū wēn zhū nóng fù zǐ shè wěi zào wén shū bèi sù

Detonating swine fever Pig farmer father and son were sued for forging documents

Am730Feb 2026

中国籍男子涉为200人造日本居留证明被捕

zhōng guó jí nán zǐ shè wéi 2 0 0 rén wěi zào rì běn jū liú zhèng míng bèi bǔ

A Chinese man was arrested for forging Japanese residence certificates for 200 people

It之家Feb 2026

...最爱发红包”省份;鸿蒙智行尊界 SUV 装车曝光;月之暗面成国内最快晋级十角兽公...

. . . zuì ài fā hóng bāo shěng fèn ; 鸿 méng zhì háng zūn jiè S U V wěi zhuāng chē pù guāng ; yuè zhī àn miàn chéng guó nèi zuì kuài jìn jí shí jiǎo shòu gōng . . .

... favorite province to send red envelopes; HarmonyOS Zhixing Zunjie SUV camouflage car exposed; The dark side of the moon became the fastest in China to advance to the decacorn male...

Nownews今日新聞Feb 2026

收假前追一波!最新烧脑神剧《莎拉的真人生》 结局翻转再翻转

shōu jiǎ qián zhuī yī bō ! zuì xīn shāo nǎo shén jù 莎 lā de zhēn wěi rén shēng jié jú fān zhuǎn zài fān zhuǎn

Chase a wave before the holiday! The latest brain-burning drama "Sarah's True and False Life" has a flipped ending and flipped again

Tatoeba

这真是彻底的虚

Zhè zhēnshi chèdǐ de xūwěi!

This is pure hypocrisy!

Tatoeba

装成警察逃跑了。

Tā wěizhuāng chéng jǐngchá táopǎo le.

He got away disguised as a policeman.

Tatoeba

我从来没有见过谁像你这么虚的。

Wǒ cóngláiméiyǒu jiàn guo shéi xiàng nǐ zhème xūwěi de.

I've never known anyone as hypocritical as you.

Tatoeba

已经不需要再装了。

Yǐjīng bù xūyào zài wěizhuāng le.

There's no need to pretend anymore.

Character Family

Homophones — Characters pronounced wěi

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 伪 (wěi) mean in Chinese?
伪 (wěi) primarily means "false." It is classified as HSK Level 7-9, making it an expert-level character. It ranks #1546 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 伪 and 确?
伪 (wěi) and 确 (què) are often confused. antonym. The key distinguishing feature: 伪 (false) vs 确 (true).
How many strokes does 伪 have?
伪 is written with 6 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 伪?
The radical associated with 伪 is 亻 (person). This radical appears in many characters related to person.
What are the components of 伪?
伪 is composed of: 亻 (semantic), 为 (phonetic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰亻为 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 伪?
Common words with 伪 include: 伪装 (wěi zhuāng, "to pretend to be (asleep etc)"); 伪造 (wěi zào, "to forge"); 虚伪 (xū wěi, "false"); 伪君子 (wěi jūn zǐ, "hypocrite"); 伪证 (wěi zhèng, "perjury"). There are over 34 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 伪 (wěi)?
Several characters share the pronunciation wěi: 危 (danger), 微 (ancient Chinese state near present-day Chongqing), 围 (to encircle), 维 (to maintain), and 6 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 伪 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 伪 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.