King's Kung-Fu& Tai Chi

Chinese symbol for “cramp”

抽筋
chōu jīn
cramp; charley horse; to pull a tendon

The closest CC-CEDICT match for cramp is 抽筋 (chōu jīn), defined as: cramp; charley horse; to pull a tendon.

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

抽 chōu
to draw out, to pull out; to sprout
radical 64 ⼿ · 8 strokes
筋 jīn
muscles; tendons
radical 118 ⽵ · 12 strokes

Other Chinese words for “cramp”

WordPinyinMeaning
挛 (攣)luán(bound form) (of muscles) to cramp; to spasm
扒钉 (扒釘)bā dīngcramp
痛性痉挛 (痛性痙攣)tòng xìng jìng luán(muscle) cramp
绞痛 (絞痛)jiǎo tòngsharp pain; cramp

Related words

Other words that share a character with 抽筋.

WordPinyinMeaning
抽烟 (抽煙)chōu yānvariant of 抽烟 (chōu yān)
抽象chōu xiàngabstract; abstraction
抽出chōu chūto take out; to extract
抽取chōu qǔto extract; to remove
抽屉 (抽屜)chōu tidrawer
钢筋 (鋼筋)gāng jīnsteel reinforcing bar
脑筋 (腦筋)nǎo jīnbrains; mind
筋疲力尽 (筋疲力盡)jīn pí lì jìnbody weary, strength exhausted (idiom); extremely tired; spent

See also: Japanese symbol for “cramp”.

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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