误 (wù): mistake, delay
误 (wù) is a Chinese character meaning “mistake, delay.” Classified as HSK Level 4 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 讠 (semantic) and 吴 (phonetic). It ranks #854 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).
Etymologically derived, 误 speech. Its radical form 讠 (speech) appears in many related characters such as 认 (rèn, to recognize, to admit), 记 (jì, to remember, to record), 识 (shí, to know, knowledge).
Definitions
- mistake, delay
Etymology & Origin
Stroke Order
Practice writing 误 with real-time feedback — trace each stroke in the correct order and build muscle memory in the HanziFeed app.
Words & Compounds
HSK Vocabulary with 误
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning | HSK |
|---|---|---|---|
| 错误adjective/noun | cuò wù | mistaken | 4 |
| 误会verb/noun | wù huì | to misunderstand | 4 |
| 误解verb/noun | wù jiě | to misunderstand | 6 |
| 失误verb/noun | shī wù | lapse | 5 |
| 耽误verb | dān wu | to delay | 6 |
Common Compounds
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 误导 | wù dǎo | to mislead |
| 延误 | yán wù | to postpone (with unfortunate consequences) |
| 无误 | wú wù | verified |
| 误入歧途 | wù rù qí tú | to take a wrong step in life (idiom) |
| 误伤 | wù shāng | to injure accidentally |
| 误杀 | wù shā | to mistakenly kill |
| 误差 | wù chā | difference |
| 口误 | kǒu wù | to misspeak |
| 误判 | wù pàn | to misjudge |
| 误诊 | wù zhěn | to misdiagnose |
| 误用 | wù yòng | to misuse |
| 误点 | wù diǎn | not on time |
| 笔误 | bǐ wù | a slip of a pen |
| 聪明反被聪明误 | cōng míng fǎn bèi cōng míng wù | (idiom) a clever person may become the victim of his own ingenuity |
| 误区 | wù qū | mistaken ideas |
误 appears in 64 compound words: 44 as the first character, 48 as the last, and 8 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 误 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.
Idioms & Chengyu (3)
Example Sentences
由于系统故障，航班延误了三个小时。
Yóuyú xìtǒng gùzhàng, hángbān yánwù le sān gè xiǎoshí.
Due to system failure, the flight was delayed by three hours.
智谱认GLM-5大模型犯三错误
zhì pǔ rèn dà mó xíng fàn sān cuò wù
Zhipu's GLM-5 Large Model Commits Three Errors
经济日报社论/台美对等贸易协定的误判与修正
jīng jì rì bào shè lùn tái měi duì děng mào yì xié dìng de wù pàn yǔ xiū zhèng
Economic Daily Editorial: The Miscalculation and Correction of the Taiwan-U.S. Reciprocal Trade Agreement
食八宝饭误吞枣核 62岁翁肚大如孕妇
shí bā bǎo fàn wù tūn zǎo hé suì wēng dù dà rú yùn fù
62-Year-Old Man's Belly Swells Like Pregnant Woman After Swallowing Date Pit While Eating Eight-Treasure Rice
川普执政周年民调崩盘!64%痛批关税误国
chuān pǔ zhí zhèng zhōu nián mín diào bēng pán ! tòng pī guān shuì wù guó
Trump's Approval Plummets on First Anniversary! 64% Slam Tariffs as Harmful to the Nation
...小时中断疑因 AI 代理工具 Kiro 误删整个环境
. . . xiǎo shí zhōng duàn yí yīn dài lǐ gōng jù wù shān zhěng gè huán jìng
The outage lasting several hours was likely caused by the AI agent tool Kiro mistakenly deleting the entire environment.
可以耽误你一点时间吗?
Kěyǐ dānwu nǐ yīdiǎn shíjiān ma?
Do you have a minute?
由于火车延误，我迟到了。
Yóuyú huǒchē yánwu, wǒ chídào le.
I was late as a result of the train delay.
抱歉，请允许我指出上文中的三个错误。
Bàoqiàn, qǐng yǔnxǔ wǒ zhǐchū shàngwén zhōng de sān gè cuòwù.
Excuse me, let me point out three mistakes in the above article.
我保证这些资料是无误的。
Wǒ bǎozhèng zhèxiē zīliào shì wúwù de.
I guarantee that this information is correct.
Character Family
Frequently Asked Questions
What does 误 (wù) mean in Chinese?
What's the difference between 误 and 娱?
How many strokes does 误 have?
What is the radical of 误?
What are the components of 误?
What are common words containing 误?
What characters sound the same as 误 (wù)?
Is 误 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
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