Chinese symbol for “burn”
烧
shāo
Traditional: 燒
to burn; to set on fire; to heat (over a fire); to boil (water, tea etc); to braise; to cook; to prepare food
The closest CC-CEDICT match for burn is 烧 (shāo), defined as: to burn; to set on fire; to heat (over a fire); to boil (water, tea etc); to braise; to cook; to prepare food; to run a fever; fever.
Before using these characters for a tattoo, check them with a native speaker. Dictionary words often have several meanings, and the right choice depends on context.
Characters and stroke order
Traditional forms
Other Chinese words for “burn”
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 焚烧 (焚燒) | fén shāo | to burn; to set on fire |
| 烧伤 (燒傷) | shāo shāng | burn (injury) |
| 燃 | rán | to burn; to ignite |
| 着 (著) | zháo | to touch; to come in contact with |
| 灼伤 (灼傷) | zhuó shāng | a burn (tissue damage from heat, chemicals etc); to burn (the skin etc) |
Related words
Other words that share a character with 烧.
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 燃烧 (燃燒) | rán shāo | to ignite; to combust |
| 烧毁 (燒燬) | shāo huǐ | to destroy (or be destroyed) by fire |
| 发烧 (發燒) | fā shāo | to have a high temperature (from illness); to have a fever; (fig.) to be fascinated with; to obsess over |
| 焚烧 (焚燒) | fén shāo | to burn; to set on fire |
| 火烧 (火燒) | huǒ shāo | to set fire to; to burn down |
| 烧烤 (燒烤) | shāo kǎo | barbecue; to roast |
See also: Japanese symbol for “burn”.
Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3); Make Me a Hanzi (Arphic Public License (graphics.txt); LGPL-3.0-or-later (dictionary.txt)); wordfreq (CC BY-SA 4.0 (data)). Retrieved 2026-10-22.