King's Kung-Fu& Tai Chi

Chinese symbol for “climb”

上
shàng
(bound form) up; upper; above; previous; first (of multiple parts); to climb; to get onto; to go up; to attend (class or university)

The closest CC-CEDICT match for climb is 上 (shàng), defined as: (bound form) up; upper; above; previous; first (of multiple parts); to climb; to get onto; to go up; to attend (class or university); (directional complement) up; (noun suffix) on; above.

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

上 shàng
above, on top, superior; to go up; to attend; previous
radical 1 ⼀ · 3 strokes

Other Chinese words for “climb”

WordPinyinMeaning
攀pānto climb (by pulling oneself up); to implicate
攀登pān dēngto climb; to pull oneself up
攀爬pān páto climb
攀附pān fùto climb (of climbing plants); to creep
爬páto crawl; to climb

Related words

Other words that share a character with 上.

WordPinyinMeaning
以上yǐ shàngthat level or higher; that amount or more; the above-mentioned
晚上wǎn shangevening; night
身上shēn shangon the body; at hand
加上jiā shàngto add; plus; in addition; moreover
上面shàng miànon top of; above-mentioned
实际上 (實際上)shí jì shàngin fact; in reality

See also: Japanese symbol for “climb”.

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.

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