(): race, nationality, ethnicity

() is a Chinese character meaning “race.” Classified as HSK Level 4 (HSK 3.0 Standard, CLEC 2022), it is composed of (structural). It ranks #549 in character frequency (SUBTLEX-CH corpus).

Etymologically derived, a group of people that swear by 矢 a single flag 方. Its radical form (square) appears in many related characters such as (fāng, square), (páng, one side), (, trip).

Native pronunciation

Definitions

  1. race
  2. nationality
  3. ethnicity

Etymology & Origin

ideographicA group of people that swear by 矢 a single flag 方

Components:structural

Stroke Order

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11

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
nounmín zúnationality4
zhōng huá mín zúthe Chinese nation5

Common Compounds

WordPinyinMeaning
jiā zúfamily
zhǒng zúrace
guì zúlord
zú rénclansman
bù zútribe
zú zhǎngclan elder
zú qúnethnic group
huáng zúthe imperial family
sài zúSerb ethnic group (abbr. for 塞爾維亞族|塞尔维亚族[Sai4 er3 wei2 ya4 zu2])
shì zúclan
yì zúdifferent tribe
zú lèiclan
wàng zúdistinguished or prominent family
shuǐ zúcollective term for aquatic animals
zú pǔgenealogical record
100
Total compounds
9
As first character
88
As last character
3
As middle character

appears in 100 compound words: 9 as the first character, 88 as the last, and 3 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.

mín
0.605620,412 co-occurrences
guì
0.58581,780 co-occurrences
jiā
0.576609,024 co-occurrences
zhuàng
0.54526,292 co-occurrences
qún
0.518115,852 co-occurrences
hàn
0.49870,368 co-occurrences
miáo
0.47827,330 co-occurrences
shì
0.47078,270 co-occurrences
0.46729,525 co-occurrences
zhǒng
0.44893,840 co-occurrences

Idioms & Chengyu (10)

dānshēn guìzúHSK 4+

well-off single; bachelor

noun
mínzú yīngxióngHSK 6+

national hero; folk hero; people's hero

noun
mín zú zì juéHSK 4+

self-determination

phrase
shǎoshù mínzúHSK 4+

ethnic minority

noun
tàilǔgézúHSK 7+

Taroko people, an ethnic group in Taiwan

noun
zhōng huá mín zúHSK 5+

the Chinese nation; the Chinese people (collective reference to all the ethnic groups in China)

phrase
zhǒngzú gélíHSK 5+

racial segregation; apartheid

noun
zhǒngzú qíshìHSK 7+

racial discrimination; racism

noun

Showing 8 of 10 idioms containing .

Example Sentences

AI-Generated

我在字典里查到了字的详细解释。

wǒ zài zì diǎn lǐ chá dào le zú zì de xiáng xì xiè shì .

I looked up the detailed explanation of the character "族" in the dictionary.

LtnFeb 2026

科技与循环群领涨 投信:美股获利动能续强

kē jì yǔ xún huán zú qún lǐng zhǎng tóu xìn : měi gǔ huò lì dòng néng xù qiáng

Technology and circulation groups led the rise Investment Trust: The profit momentum of US stocks continues to be strong

中時新聞網Feb 2026

喝苦茶油养胃 医曝最佳饮用法 3群有禁忌

hē kǔ chá yóu yǎng wèi yī pù zuì jiā yǐn yòng fǎ 3 zú qún yǒu jīn jì

Drinking bitter tea oil to nourish the stomach and the best way to drink it is 3 groups have taboos

StheadlineFeb 2026

伊朗局势|伊媒:一旦开战特朗普家在中东项目将成攻击目标

yī lǎng jú shì yī méi : yī dàn kāi zhàn tè lǎng pǔ jiā zú zài zhōng dōng xiàng mù jiāng chéng gōng jī mù biāo

Iranian media: Once the war starts, the Trump family's project in the Middle East will be the target

鉅亨網 - 財經新聞、全球指數、股市報價、商品行情、理財投資Feb 2026

...红盘奔向3万4?两大变数酿短压 关注五大群走势

. . . hóng pán bēn xiàng 3 wàn 4 ? liǎng dà biàn shǔ niàng duǎn yā guān zhù wǔ dà zú qún zǒu shì

... The red plate rushes to 30,000 4? Two major variables cause short-term pressure and pay attention to the trend of the five major groups

BastillepostFeb 2026

脂肪肝不是胖人专利 三类高危群与改善关键

zhī fáng gān bù shì pàng rén zhuān lì sān lèi gāo wēi zú qún yǔ gǎi shàn guān jiàn

Fatty liver is not the patent of fat people, three types of high-risk groups and the key to improvement

Tatoeba

什么样的人会将种灭绝者,称之为“英雄”?

Shénmeyàng de rén huì jiāng zhǒngzúmièjué zhě, chēngzhīwéi "yīngxióng "?

What kind of person looks up to a genocidal killer and calls him a hero?

Tatoeba

请不要做任何有损松野家名声的事!

Qǐng bù yào zuò rènhé yǒu sǔn sōngyě jiāzú míngshēng de shì!

Please don't do anything that would besmirch the Matsuno family name!

Tatoeba

日本人是勤劳的民

Rìběnrén shì qínláo de mínzú.

The Japanese are an industrious people.

Tatoeba

希腊人以前是信奉多神的民

Xīlàrén yǐqián shì xìnfèng duō shén de mínzú.

The Greeks used to worship several gods.

Character Family

Radical Family — Characters sharing the square radical

Homophones — Characters pronounced

Frequently Asked Questions

What does 族 (zú) mean in Chinese?
族 (zú) primarily means "race." It is classified as HSK Level 4, making it an upper-intermediate character. It ranks #549 in character frequency.
How many strokes does 族 have?
族 is written with 11 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 族?
The radical associated with 族 is 方 (square). This radical appears in many characters related to square.
What are the components of 族?
族 is composed of: 方 (structural), undefined (phonetic). Understanding the components helps with both memorization and recognizing related characters.
What are common words containing 族?
Common words with 族 include: 家族 (jiā zú, "family"); 种族 (zhǒng zú, "race"); 贵族 (guì zú, "lord"); 民族 (mín zú, "nationality"); 族人 (zú rén, "clansman"). There are over 100 compound words containing this character.
What characters sound the same as 族 (zú)?
Several characters share the pronunciation zú: 租 (to hire), 足 (foot), 卒 (soldier), 阻 (to hinder), and 2 more. Context and tones help distinguish between them in speech and writing.
Is 族 the same in simplified and traditional Chinese?
Yes, 族 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.