改头换面 — Chinese idiom
改头换面
gǎi tóu huàn miàn
Traditional: 改頭換面
Meaning
- to change outwardly while remaining essentially the same (derog.)
- (Tw) (non-derogatory) to change considerably
- to undergo a transformation
Character by character
- 改gǎito alter, to change, to improve, to remodel
- 头tóuhead; chief, boss; first, top
- 换huànto change; to exchange, to swap, to trade
- 面miànface; surface, side; plane, dimension
Idioms sharing a character
- 一改故辙 yī gǎi gù zhé
- 幡然改图 fān rán gǎi tú
- 改弦易辙 gǎi xián yì zhé
- 改过自新 gǎi guò zì xīn
- 改邪归正 gǎi xié guī zhèng
- 朝令夕改 zhāo lìng xī gǎi
- 朝闻夕改 zhāo wén xī gǎi
- 朝过夕改 zhāo guò xī gǎi
- 死不改悔 sǐ bù gǎi huǐ
- 痛改前非 tòng gǎi qián fēi
Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.