熄 (xī): to extinguish, to put out (fire), to quench

熄 (xī) is a Chinese character meaning “to extinguish.” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 火 (structural) and 息 (structural). It ranks #2669 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 熄 to end 息 a flame 火; 息 also provides the pronunciation. Its radical form 火 (fire) appears in many related characters such as 火 (huǒ, fire), 灯 (dēng, lamp, light), 烟 (yān, smoke).

Spoken pronunciation

Definitions

  1. to extinguish
  2. to put out (fire)
  3. to quench

Etymology & Origin

熄

ideographicTo end 息 a flame 火; 息 also provides the pronunciation

Decomposition: ⿰火息 (layout: left-right)

Stroke Order

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

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

Words & Compounds

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
熄灭verbxī mièto stop burning
熄灯verbxī dēngturn out the lights
熄火verbxī huǒ(of fire, lamp etc) to go out
智熄adjectivezhì xī(slang) extremely foolish
吹熄verbchuī xīto blow out (a flame)
熄屏xī píngvariant of 息屏
6
Total compounds
67
As first character
33
As last character
0
As middle character

熄 appears in 6 compound words: 67 as the first character, 33 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 熄 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

灭miè
0.564850 co-occurrences
怠dài
0.554146 co-occurrences
火huǒ
0.5042,443 co-occurrences
灯dēng
0.467238 co-occurrences
焰yàn
0.452130 co-occurrences
擎qíng
0.451248 co-occurrences
吹chuī
0.446194 co-occurrences
烛zhú
0.44130 co-occurrences
盏zhǎn
0.42816 co-occurrences
匙chí
0.42560 co-occurrences

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

冬天里,一家人围坐在炉熄旁取暖聊天。

dōng tiān lǐ , yī jiā rén wéi zuò zài lú xī páng qǔ nuǎn liáo tiān .

In winter, the family gathers around the stove to warm themselves and chat.

東方日報Mar 2026

老围三级火今晨大致救熄 两村屋焚毁 火警无可疑起因待查

lǎo wéi sān jí huǒ jīn chén dà zhì jiù xī liǎng cūn wū fén huǐ huǒ jǐng wú kě yí qǐ yīn dài chá

A Level 3 fire in Laowei was largely extinguished this morning; two villages were destroyed by the blaze; the cause of the fire is under investigation and no suspicious circumstances have been identified

EttodayMar 2026

贾吉关键时刻又软手!熄火吞3K被骂爆 球迷怒:别再让他打WBC

gǔ jí guān jiàn shí kè yòu ruǎn shǒu ! xī huǒ tūn 3 K bèi mà bào qiú mí nù : bié zài ràng tā dǎ W B C

Jagi again choked in the clutch! He went 0-for-3 and got slammed by fans, who are furious: "Don't let him play in the WBC anymore!"

LtnFeb 2026

美PPI冲高浇熄联准会降息预期 道琼开盘一度跌近800点

měi P P I chōng gāo jiāo xī lián zhǔn huì jiàng xī yù qī dào 琼 kāi pán yī dù diē jìn 8 0 0 diǎn

U.S. PPI soared to extinguish expectations of the Federal Reserve's interest rate cut The Dow Jones opened down nearly 800 points

Hk01.comFeb 2026

领克语音识别错熄全车灯光 车主唤开竟答“仲未识喔” 官方...

lǐng kè yǔ yīn shí bié cuò xī quán chē dēng guāng chē zhǔ huàn kāi jìng dā zhòng wèi shí 喔 guān fāng . . .

Lynk & Co's voice recognition mistakenly turned off the lights of the whole car, and the owner called out and replied, "I don't know it yet" official...

東方日報Feb 2026

牛池湾纪律部队宿舍天台失火 救熄起因待查

niú chí wān jì lǜ bù duì sù shě tiān tái shī huǒ jiù xī qǐ yīn dài chá

The roof of the Niuchiwan Disciplined Forces dormitory caught fire, and the cause of the extinguishing was to be investigated

Tatoeba

许个愿,然后吹熄蜡烛吧。

Xǔ gè yuàn, ránhòu chuīxī làzhú ba.

Make a wish and blow out the candles.

Tatoeba

火很快便被扑熄了,房子只受到轻微损坏。

Huǒ hěn kuài biàn bèi pū xī le, fángzi zhǐ shòudào qīngwēi sǔnhuài.

The house did not suffer much damage because the fire was quickly put out.

Tatoeba

别忘了把香烟熄掉。

Bié wàng le bǎ xiāngyān xī diào.

Don't forget to extinguish your cigarette.

Tatoeba

就算我的家发生火灾,也会很快就被扑熄的。

Jiùsuàn wǒ de jiā fāshēng huǒzāi, yě huì hěn kuài jiù bèi pū xī de.

Even if my house catches fire it would soon be put out.

Character Family

Homophones — Characters pronounced xī

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 熄 (xī) mean in Chinese?
熄 (xī) primarily means "to extinguish." It is classified as HSK Level 7-9, making it an expert-level character. It ranks #2669 in character frequency.
How many strokes does 熄 have?
熄 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 熄?
The radical associated with 熄 is 火 (fire). This radical appears in many characters related to fire.
What are the components of 熄?
熄 is composed of: 火 (structural), 息 (structural). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰火息 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 熄?
Common words with 熄 include: 熄灭 (xī miè, "to stop burning"); 熄灯 (xī dēng, "turn out the lights"); 熄火 (xī huǒ, "(of fire, lamp etc) to go out"); 智熄 (zhì xī, "(slang) extremely foolish"); 吹熄 (chuī xī, "to blow out (a flame)"). There are over 6 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 熄 (xī)?
Several characters share the pronunciation xī: 西 (the West), 系 (to connect), 息 (breath), 希 (to hope), and 6 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 熄 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 熄 is written the same way in both simplified and traditional Chinese.

Practice writing 熄 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.