Chinese symbol for “seemingly”
看起来
kàn qǐ lai
Traditional: 看起來
seemingly; apparently; looks as if; appears to be; gives the impression that; seems on the face of it to be
The closest CC-CEDICT match for seemingly is 看起来 (kàn qǐ lai), defined as: seemingly; apparently; looks as if; appears to be; gives the impression that; seems on the face of it to be.
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 “seemingly”
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 似乎 | sì hū | it seems; seemingly; as if |
| 仿佛 | fǎng fú | to seem; as if; seemingly; alike; similar |
| 仿佛 (彷彿) | fǎng fú | to seem; as if; seemingly; alike; similar |
| 髣 | fǎng | seemingly |
Related words
Other words that share a character with 看起来.
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 看到 | kàn dào | to see |
| 看看 | kàn kan | to take a look at; to examine |
| 看见 (看見) | kàn jiàn | to see; to catch sight of |
| 看来 (看來) | kàn lai | apparently; it seems that |
| 看法 | kàn fǎ | way of looking at a thing; view |
| 起来 (起來) | qǐ lai | to stand up; to get up; also pr. [qi3lai2] |
| 一起 | yī qǐ | (in) the same place; together; in company (with) |
| 引起 | yǐn qǐ | to give rise to; to lead to; to cause; to arouse |
| 出来 (出來) | chū lái | to come out; to appear |
See also: Japanese symbol for “seemingly”.
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.