Chinese symbol for “death”
死亡
sǐ wáng
to die; death
The closest CC-CEDICT match for death is 死亡 (sǐ wáng), defined as: to die; death.
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
Other Chinese words for “death”
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 往死里 (往死裡) | wǎng sǐ lǐ | (coll.) (to beat etc) to death |
| 死神 | sǐ shén | mythological figure (such as the Grim Reaper) in charge of taking the souls of those who die; (fig.) death |
| 毙 (斃) | bì | to die; to shoot dead |
| 半死 | bàn sǐ | half dead (of torment, hunger, tiredness etc); (tired) to death |
| 死命 | sǐ mìng | doom; death |
Related words
Other words that share a character with 死亡.
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 杀死 (殺死) | shā sǐ | to kill |
| 死刑 | sǐ xíng | death penalty; capital punishment |
| 死者 | sǐ zhě | the dead; the deceased |
| 死去 | sǐ qù | to die |
| 打死 | dǎ sǐ | to kill; to beat to death |
| 伤亡 (傷亡) | shāng wáng | casualties; injuries and deaths |
| 身亡 | shēn wáng | to die |
| 灭亡 (滅亡) | miè wáng | to be destroyed; to become extinct; to perish; to die out; to destroy; to exterminate |
See also: Japanese symbol for “death”.
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.