(): anxiety, sympathy, to sympathize

() is a Chinese character meaning “anxiety.” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of (semantic) and (phonetic). It ranks #2842 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, heart. Its radical form (heart) appears in many related characters such as (máng, busy), (kuài, fast, happy), (zěn, how).

Native pronunciation

Definitions

  1. anxiety
  2. sympathy
  3. to sympathize

Etymology & Origin

pictophoneticheart

Decomposition: ⿰忄血 (layout: left-right)

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9

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
xù shānshirt (loanword)
fǔ xù jīncompensation payment (for injury)
tǐ xùto empathize with
tǐ xù shānT-shirt
lián xùto take pity
fǔ xù(of an organization that has a duty of care) to give financial support to relatives of sb who has died or suffered se...
bù xù rén yánnot to worry about the gossip (idiom)
tǐ xù rù wēito emphasize down to last detail (idiom)
yǔn shēn bù xùto die without regrets (idiom)
ān fù xù qióngto give sympathy to the rich and relief to the poor (idiom)
ān fù xù pínto give sympathy to the rich and relief to the poor (idiom)
bù xùnot to worry
fèng xùpayment and pension
xù kuìto relieve the distressed
xù líto give relief to widows
18
Total compounds
17
As first character
50
As last character
33
As middle character

appears in 18 compound words: 17 as the first character, 50 as the last, and 33 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.

0.5903,324 co-occurrences
shān
0.5801,314 co-occurrences
xíng
0.4692,694 co-occurrences
0.447216 co-occurrences
shàn
0.43560 co-occurrences
0.425786 co-occurrences
bāo
0.414234 co-occurrences
lián
0.401120 co-occurrences
0.392318 co-occurrences
yōu
0.388708 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (2)

ān fù xù pínHSK 7+

to give sympathy to the rich and relief to the poor (idiom)

phrase
ān fù xù qióngHSK 7+

to give sympathy to the rich and relief to the poor (idiom)

phrase

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

甘情愿地帮助每一个需要帮助的人。

tā xù gān qíng yuàn dì bāng zhù měi yī gě xū yāo bāng zhù de rén .

He willingly helps everyone in need.

Character Family

Homophones — Characters pronounced

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 恤 (xù) mean in Chinese?
恤 (xù) primarily means "anxiety." It is classified as HSK Level 7-9, making it an expert-level character. It ranks #2842 in character frequency.
How many strokes does 恤 have?
恤 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 恤?
The radical associated with 恤 is 忄 (heart). This radical appears in many characters related to heart.
What are the components of 恤?
恤 is composed of: 忄 (semantic), 血 (phonetic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰忄血 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 恤?
Common words with 恤 include: 恤衫 (xù shān, "shirt (loanword)"); 抚恤金 (fǔ xù jīn, "compensation payment (for injury)"); 体恤 (tǐ xù, "to empathize with"); 体恤衫 (tǐ xù shān, "T-shirt"); 怜恤 (lián xù, "to take pity"). There are over 18 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 恤 (xù)?
Several characters share the pronunciation xù: 须 (must), 虚 (emptiness), 墟 (ruins), 需 (to need), and 6 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 恤 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 恤 is written the same way in both simplified and traditional Chinese.

Practice writing 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.