King's Kung-Fu& Tai Chi

Chinese symbol for “cleaver”

菜刀
cài dāo
vegetable knife; kitchen knife; cleaver; measure word: 把 (bǎ)

The closest CC-CEDICT match for cleaver is 菜刀 (cài dāo), defined as: vegetable knife; kitchen knife; cleaver; measure word: 把 (bǎ).

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

菜 cài
vegetables; order, dish; food
radical 140 ⾋ · 12 strokes
刀 dāo
knife; old coin; measure
radical 18 ⼑ · 2 strokes

Related words

Other words that share a character with 菜刀.

WordPinyinMeaning
蔬菜shū càivegetables
菜单 (菜單)cài dānmenu; measure word: 份 (fèn), 张 (zhāng)
菜肴 (菜餚)cài yáovegetable and meat dishes; dish
菠菜bō càispinach (CL:棵 (kē)); (slang) gambling; gambler (alternative term for 博彩 (bó cǎi))
白菜bái càiChinese cabbage, esp. napa cabbage (Brassica rapa subsp. pekinensis); sometimes used to refer to bok choy (Brassica rapa subsp. chinensis)
菜鸟 (菜鳥)cài niǎo(coll.) sb new to a particular subject; rookie
刀子dāo ziknife; measure word: 把 (bǎ)
剪刀jiǎn dāoscissors; measure word: 把 (bǎ)

See also: Japanese symbol for “cleaver”.

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.