(): (literary) I, me, extra, surplus

() is a Chinese character meaning “(literary) i.” Classified as HSK Level 5 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of (structural). It ranks #729 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Native pronunciation

Definitions

  1. (literary) I
  2. me
  3. extra
  4. surplus

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7

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
adjectiveyè yúin one's spare time5
pronounqí yúthe rest5
verb/adjectiveduō yúsuperfluous6
verbshèng yúremainder6
nounyú ébalance (of an account, bill etc)6

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
yú shēngthe remaining years of one's life
yú dìmargin
yú xiàremaining
cán yúremnant
bù yí yú lìto spare no pains or effort (idiom)
chuò chuò yǒu yú(idiom) more than enough
kòng yúfree
yú zhènearthquake aftershock
kè yúafter school
yú guāng(out of) the corner of one's eyes
fù yuin surplus
yú lìenergy left over (to do sth else)
yú jìnember
yíng yúsurplus
yǒu yúto have an abundance
100
Total compounds
52
As first character
30
As last character
18
As middle character

appears in 100 compound words: 52 as the first character, 30 as the last, and 18 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.

shèng
0.62339,006 co-occurrences
rǒng
0.5454,098 co-occurrences
wàn
0.51957,612 co-occurrences
cán
0.50412,324 co-occurrences
háng
0.47910,218 co-occurrences
0.4755,250 co-occurrences
bǎi
0.44232,844 co-occurrences
0.43340,556 co-occurrences
0.4306,276 co-occurrences
0.425100,824 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (18)

bùyíyúlìHSK 5+

to do all one can; to do one's utmost; to spare no effort; to go all-out

phrase
chá yú fàn bǎoHSK 5+

see 茶餘飯後|茶余饭后[cha2 yu2 fan4 hou4]

phrase
cháyúfànhòuHSK 5+

leisure time; free time

phrase
cháyújiǔhòuHSK 5+

leisure time; free time

phrase
chuòchuòyǒuyúHSK 7+

more than sufficient; ample

phrase
fù fù yǒu yúHSK 5+

richly provided for; having enough and to spare

phrase
hǔkǒuyúshēngHSK 5+

to survive a disaster; to have a narrow escape

phrase
huī huī yǒu yúHSK 5+

lit. to have an abundance of space; room to maneuver (idiom)

phrase
jī è yú yāngHSK 7+

Accumulated evil will be repaid in suffering (idiom).

phrase
jiéhòuyúshēngHSK 7+

to survive a disaster; to outlive a calamity

phrase
shèngyújiàzhíHSK 5+

surplus value

noun
shuāng qū yú gēHSK 6+

hyperbolic cosecant, i.e. function cosech(x)

phrase

Showing 12 of 18 idioms containing .

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

那个影在月光下显得格外孤独。

nā gě yú yǐng zài yuè guāng xià xiǎn dé gé wài gū dú .

That lingering shadow appeared especially lonely in the moonlight.

LtnFeb 2026

台中市38家厨养猪场 目前5家申请转型

tái zhōng shì 3 8 jiā chú yú yǎng zhū chǎng mù qián 5 jiā shēn qǐng zhuǎn xíng

Taichung City's 38 food waste pig farms are currently 5 applying for transformation

99 健康网Feb 2026

男生小便完甩一下和膀胱排空有关吗?确保残尿最少对吗

nán shēng xiǎo biàn wán shuǎi yī xià hé bǎng 胱 pái kōng yǒu guān ma ? què bǎo cán yú niào zuì shǎo duì ma

Is it related to bladder emptying after a boy urinating? Make sure residual urine is minimal, right?

WorldjournalFeb 2026

“庆年”男星“状告生父”历史被挖 摇身金牌讲...

qìng yú nián nán xīng zhuàng gào shēng fù lì shǐ bèi wā yáo shēn jīn pái jiǎng . . .

"Qing Yu Nian" male star "sued his biological father" for "history was dug up and turned into a gold medal to say...

東方日報Feb 2026

老妇创意善用厨 巧手制艺术品

lǎo fù chuàng yì shàn yòng chú yú qiǎo shǒu zhì yì shù pǐn

The old woman creatively uses kitchen waste to make artworks by hand

百度新闻Feb 2026

...湘潭我的家·新春走基层丨湖南裕能:600名职..

. . . 湘 tán wǒ de jiā xīn chūn zǒu jī céng 丨 hú nán yù néng : 6 0 0 yú míng zhí . .

... Xiangtan My Home, New Year Grassroots Level丨Hunan Yuneng: More than 600 positions:

Tatoeba

你有多的钥匙吗?

Nǐ yǒu duōyú de yàoshi ma?

Do you have an extra key?

Tatoeba

我的业爱好是拍野花的照片。

Wǒ de yèyú àihào shì pāi yěhuā de zhàopiàn.

My hobby is taking pictures of wild flowers.

Tatoeba

我想和你共渡生。

Wǒ xiǎng hé nǐ gòng dù yú shēng.

I want to spend my life with you.

Tatoeba

他不遗力帮助我。

Tā bùyíyúlì bāngzhù wǒ.

He spared no pains to help me.

Character Family

Homophones — Characters pronounced

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 余 (yú) mean in Chinese?
余 (yú) primarily means "(literary) i." It is classified as HSK Level 5, making it an advanced character. It ranks #729 in character frequency.
How many strokes does 余 have?
余 is written with 7 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 余?
The radical associated with 余 is 亻 (person). This radical appears in many characters related to person.
What are the components of 余?
余 is composed of: 人 (structural). Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 余?
Common words with 余 include: 余生 (yú shēng, "the remaining years of one's life"); 业余 (yè yú, "in one's spare time"); 其余 (qí yú, "the rest"); 多余 (duō yú, "superfluous"); 余地 (yú dì, "margin"). There are over 100 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 余 (yú)?
Several characters share the pronunciation yú: 于 ((of time or place) in), 鱼 (fish), 与 (and), 羽 (feather), and 6 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 余 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 余 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.