Chinese symbol for “dwell”
处
chǔ
Traditional: 處
to reside; to live; to dwell; to be in
The closest CC-CEDICT match for dwell is 处 (chǔ), defined as: to reside; to live; to dwell; to be in; to be situated at; to stay.
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 “dwell”
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 居住 | jū zhù | to reside; to dwell |
| 栖 (棲) | qī | to perch; to rest (of birds) |
| 栖息 (棲息) | qī xī | (of a bird) to perch; (of creatures in general) to inhabit; to dwell |
| 栖住 (棲住) | qī zhù | to dwell; to live |
Related words
Other words that share a character with 处.
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 处理 (處理) | chǔ lǐ | to handle; to deal with; to punish |
| 处于 (處於) | chǔ yú | to be in (some state, position, or condition) |
| 到处 (到處) | dào chù | everywhere |
| 好处 (好處) | hǎo chǔ | easy to get along with |
| 处罚 (處罰) | chǔ fá | to penalize; to punish |
See also: Japanese symbol for “dwell”.
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.