(yàn): bright, fresh and attractive, glamorous, (bound form) amorous, romantic, (literary) to admire, to envy

(yàn) is a Chinese character meaning “bright.” Classified as HSK Level 6 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of (structural) and (structural). It ranks #2068 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, lush 丰 and sexy 色. Its radical form (color) appears in many related characters such as (, color).

Native pronunciation

Definitions

  1. bright
  2. fresh and attractive
  3. glamorous
  4. (bound form) amorous
  5. romantic
  6. (literary) to admire
  7. to envy

Etymology & Origin

ideographicLush 丰 and sexy 色

Decomposition: ⿰丰色 (layout: left-right)

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10

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

Words & Compounds

HSK Vocabulary with

WordPinyinMeaningHSK
adjectivexiān yànvariant of 鮮豔|鲜艳[xian1 yan4]6

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
měi yànbeautiful and alluring
yàn fúluck with women
nóng zhuāng yàn mǒto apply makeup conspicuously (idiom)
xiāng yànalluring
yàn lìgorgeous
yàn yáng tiānbright sunny day
yāo yànpretty and flirtatious
jiāo yàntender and beautiful
lěng yàn(of a woman) beautiful but aloof
yàn zhàonude picture
nóng yàn(of colors) garish
yàn xiàn(literary) to admire
yàn qíngromantic love
yàn hóng sècrimson
yàn rú táo lǐlit. beautiful as peach and prune
32
Total compounds
41
As first character
53
As last character
6
As middle character

appears in 32 compound words: 41 as the first character, 53 as the last, and 6 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.

xiān
0.5784,128 co-occurrences
jīng
0.5251,321 co-occurrences
0.4882,148 co-occurrences
xiàn
0.481168 co-occurrences
jiāo
0.473210 co-occurrences
yán
0.468850 co-occurrences
cǎi
0.4521,698 co-occurrences
hóng
0.4341,620 co-occurrences
píng
0.407246 co-occurrences
zhuāng
0.401108 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (3)

nóngzhuāngyànmǒHSK 7+

to wear heavy make-up; to be caked in make-up

phrase
yàn rú táo lǐHSK 6+

lit. beautiful as peach and prune; fig. radiant beauty

phrase
zhēngyándòuyànHSK 6+

to contend in beauty and fascination

phrase

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

了解字的来源,有助于理解中国文化。

le xiè yàn zì de lái yuán , yǒu zhù yú lǐ xiè zhōng guó wén huā .

Understanding the origin of the character "艳" helps to comprehend Chinese culture.

UdnnewsindexFeb 2026

...华踩街、晚会热闹非凡 各式龙队现身争奇斗

. . . huá cǎi jiē , wǎn huì rè nào fēi fán gè shì lóng duì xiàn shēn zhēng qí dǒu yàn

... Hua stepped on the street, the party was very lively, and all kinds of dragon teams appeared to compete for beauty

中国军网Feb 2026

军队人大代表履职尽责巡礼丨丰:推动部队资金保障更加精准高效

jūn duì rén dà dài biǎo lǚ zhí jǐn zé xún lǐ 丨 fēng yàn : tuī dòng bù duì zī jīn bǎo zhàng gēng jiā jīng zhǔn gāo xiào

Military people's congress deputies perform their duties and responsibilities tour丨Fengyan: Promote more accurate and efficient financial support for the troops

UdnnewsindexFeb 2026

台中市长提名 李秋:为何蓝闹到现在“结果会像抖动红绳ho...

tái zhōng shì cháng tí míng lǐ yàn qiū : wéi hé lán nào dào xiàn zài jié guǒ huì xiàng dǒu dòng hóng shéng h o . . .

Taichung Mayor Nomination Li Yanqiu: Why is Lan making trouble until now, "The result will be like shaking the red rope ho...

東方日報Feb 2026

90年代星突然升“官” 获马国政府委以重任衣锦还...

9 0 nián dài yàn xīng tū rán shēng guān huò mǎ guó zhèng fǔ wěi yǐ chóng rèn yī jǐn hái . . .

In the 90s, the star was suddenly promoted to an "official" and was entrusted by the Malaysian government with an important task.

風傳媒Feb 2026

...不会生产,全靠政府买单”中国春晚机器人惊全球,《经济学人》为何说是“昂贵的科技泡...

. . . bù huì shēng chǎn , quán kào zhèng fǔ mǎi dān zhōng guó chūn wǎn jī qì rén jīng yàn quán qiú , jīng jì xué rén wéi hé shuō shì áng guì de kē jì pāo . . .

... It will not produce, it all depends on the government to pay for it" The Chinese Spring Festival Gala robots amazed the world, why did The Economist say that it was an "expensive technology bubble...

Tatoeba

昨天去酒吧有遇吗?

Zuótiān qù jiǔbā yǒu yànyù ma?

Did you have any romantic encounter at the bar last night?

Tatoeba

他看见色彩鲜的鸟、花朵和树叶。

Tā kànjiàn sècǎi xiānyàn de niǎo, huāduǒ hé shùyè.

He saw brightly-colored birds, flowers and leaves.

Tatoeba

和这幅比起上来,那幅画的色彩鲜多了。

Hé zhè fú bǐqǐ shànglái, nà fú huà de sècǎi xiānyàn duō le.

The picture is colorful in contrast with this one.

Character Family

Radical Family — Characters sharing the color radical

Related Characters

Homophones — Characters pronounced yàn

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 艳 (yàn) mean in Chinese?
艳 (yàn) primarily means "bright." It is classified as HSK Level 6, making it an advanced character. It ranks #2068 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 艳 and 暧?
艳 (yàn) and 暧 (ài) are often confused. antonym. The key distinguishing feature: 艳 (bright) vs 暧 (dim).
How many strokes does 艳 have?
艳 is written with 10 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 艳?
The radical associated with 艳 is 色 (color). This radical appears in many characters related to color.
What are the components of 艳?
艳 is composed of: 丰 (structural), 色 (structural). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰丰色 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 艳?
Common words with 艳 include: 美艳 (měi yàn, "beautiful and alluring"); 鲜艳 (xiān yàn, "variant of 鮮豔|鲜艳[xian1 yan4]"); 艳福 (yàn fú, "luck with women"); 浓妆艳抹 (nóng zhuāng yàn mǒ, "to apply makeup conspicuously (idiom)"); 香艳 (xiāng yàn, "alluring"). There are over 32 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 艳 (yàn)?
Several characters share the pronunciation yàn: 烟 (smoke), 延 (to prolong), 严 (tight (closely sealed)), 言 (words), and 6 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 艳 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 艳 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.