King's Kung-Fu& Tai Chi

Chinese symbol for “helpless”

无助
wú zhù
Traditional: 無助
helpless; helplessness; feeling useless; no help

The closest CC-CEDICT match for helpless is 无助 (wú zhù), defined as: helpless; helplessness; feeling useless; no help.

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

无 wú
no, not; lacking, -less
radical 71 ⽆ · 4 strokes
助 zhù
to help, to aid, to assist
radical 19 ⼒ · 7 strokes

Traditional forms

Other Chinese words for “helpless”

WordPinyinMeaning
无措 (無措)wú cuòhelpless
无奈 (無奈)wú nàito have no alternative; frustrated
自身难保 (自身難保)zì shēn nán bǎopowerless to defend oneself (idiom); helpless
束手shù shǒuto have one's hands tied; helpless
无援 (無援)wú yuánwithout support; helpless

Related words

Other words that share a character with 无助.

WordPinyinMeaning
无法 (無法)wú fǎunable to; incapable of
无论 (無論)wú lùnno matter what or how; regardless of whether...
毫无 (毫無)háo wúnot in the least; to completely lack
无限 (無限)wú xiànunlimited; unbounded; infinite
无关 (無關)wú guānunrelated; having nothing to do (with sth else)
无数 (無數)wú shùcountless; numberless
帮助 (幫助)bāng zhùassistance; aid; to help; to assist
协助 (協助)xié zhùto provide assistance; to aid

See also: Japanese symbol for “helpless”.

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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