外强中干 — Chinese idiom

Meaning

• strong in appearance but weak in reality

Character by character

• 外wàiout, outside, external; foreign; in addition
• 强qiángstrong, powerful, energetic
• 中zhōngcentral; center, middle; amidst; to hit (target),
• 干gānarid, dry; to oppose; to offend; to invade

Idioms sharing a character

• 九霄云外 jiǔ xiāo yún wài
• 付之度外 fù zhī dù wài
• 内忧外困 nèi yōu wài kùn
• 内忧外患 nèi yōu wài huàn
• 出乎意外 chū hū yì wài
• 出人意外 chū rén yì wài
• 古今中外 gǔ jīn zhōng wài
• 吃里扒外 chī lǐ pá wài
• 喜出望外 xǐ chū wàng wài
• 外圆内方 wài yuán nèi fāng

Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.