沼 (zhǎo): pond, pool

沼 (zhǎo) is a Chinese character meaning “pond.” Classified as HSK Level 7-9 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of 氵 (semantic) and 召 (phonetic). It ranks #2396 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, 沼 water. Its radical form 氵 (water) appears in many related characters such as 水 (shuǐ, water), 汉 (hàn, Han ethnic group), 汽 (qì, steam).

Native pronunciation
HSK 7-9Radical: 氵 water8 strokesFrequency #2396氵 semantic召 phonetic

Definitions

  1. pond
  2. pool

Etymology & Origin

沼

pictophoneticwater

Decomposition: ⿰氵召 (layout: left-right)

Components:氵semantic召phonetic

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8

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

Words & Compounds

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
沼泽zhǎo zémarsh
沼泽地zhǎo zé dìmarsh
泥沼ní zhǎoswamp
沼气zhǎo qìmarsh gas
池沼chí zhǎopool
沼泽地带zhǎo zé dì dàimarsh
湖沼学hú zhǎo xuélimnology
沼泽大尾莺zhǎo zé dà wěi yīng(bird species of China) striated grassbird (Megalurus palustris)
日本沼虾rì běn zhǎo xiāoriental river prawn (Macrobrachium nipponense), a species of freshwater shrimp, also called 青蝦|青虾[qing1 xia1]
沼泽山雀zhǎo zé shān què(bird species of China) marsh tit (Poecile palustris)
湖沼hú zhǎolakes and marshes
沼狸zhǎo límeerkat
12
Total compounds
58
As first character
25
As last character
17
As middle character

沼 appears in 12 compound words: 58 as the first character, 25 as the last, and 17 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 沼 in natural Chinese text, ranked by NPMI (Normalized Pointwise Mutual Information) — a statistical measure of association strength.

泽zé
0.62817,991 co-occurrences
悟wù
0.4892,472 co-occurrences
泥ní
0.4894,182 co-occurrences
柿shì
0.470612 co-occurrences
湿shī
0.4641,512 co-occurrences
津jīn
0.4605,586 co-occurrences
仙xiān
0.4473,492 co-occurrences
浅qiǎn
0.4421,236 co-occurrences
田tián
0.44111,370 co-occurrences
炭tàn
0.427960 co-occurrences

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

暴雨过后，沼水上涨，淹没了低洼的街道。

bào yǔ guò hòu , zhǎo shuǐ shǎng zhǎng , yān méi le dī 洼 de jiē dào .

After the downpour, the swamp water rose, flooding the low-lying streets.

Hk01.comMar 2026

...战:特朗普“秒杀”哈梅内伊 却自投战争泥沼

. . . zhàn : tè lǎng pǔ miǎo shā hā méi nèi yī què zì tóu zhàn zhēng ní zhǎo

... War: Trump "killed" Khamenei in seconds but threw himself into the quagmire of war

Tatoeba

你不能在沼泽地上建造建筑物。

Nǐ bù néng zài zhǎozédì shàng jiànzào jiànzhùwù.

You can't build buildings on swampy land.

Tatoeba

他独自一人住在沼泽地里的一栋小屋里。

Tā dúzì yī rén zhù zài zhǎozédì lǐ de yī dòng xiǎowū lǐ.

He lives alone in a little cottage in the swamp.

Tatoeba

许多苍鹭在沼泽地中生活。

Xǔduō cānglù zài zhǎozédì zhōng shēnghuó.

Lots of herons live in the marsh.

Character Family

氵 Radical Family — Characters sharing the water radical

澳ào滨bīn濒bīn波bō沧cāng测cè潮cháo澈chè澄chéng池chí

Related Characters

水shuǐ汉hàn汽qì没méi洗xǐ渴kě永yǒng求qiú河hé油yóu

Homophones — Characters pronounced zhǎo

招zhāo爪zhǎo找zhǎo兆zhào赵zhào照zhào罩zhào肇zhào

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 沼 (zhǎo) mean in Chinese?
沼 (zhǎo) primarily means "pond." It is classified as HSK Level 7-9, making it an expert-level character. It ranks #2396 in character frequency.
What's the difference between 沼 and 绍?
沼 (zhǎo) and 绍 (shào) are often confused. confusable. The key distinguishing feature: 氵 vs 纟 (same 召 component).
How many strokes does 沼 have?
沼 is written with 8 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 沼?
The radical associated with 沼 is 氵 (water). This radical appears in many characters related to water.
What are the components of 沼?
沼 is composed of: 氵 (semantic), 召 (phonetic). Its IDS decomposition is ⿰氵召 with a left-right layout. Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 沼?
Common words with 沼 include: 沼泽 (zhǎo zé, "marsh"); 沼泽地 (zhǎo zé dì, "marsh"); 泥沼 (ní zhǎo, "swamp"); 沼气 (zhǎo qì, "marsh gas"); 池沼 (chí zhǎo, "pool"). There are over 12 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 沼 (zhǎo)?
Several characters share the pronunciation zhǎo: 招 (to recruit, 招手), 爪 (foot of a bird or animal), 找 (to look for), 兆 ((bound form) omen), and 4 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 沼 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 沼 is written the same way in both simplified and traditional Chinese.

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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.