Chinese symbol for “superfluous”
多余
duō yú
Traditional: 多餘
superfluous; unnecessary; surplus
The closest CC-CEDICT match for superfluous is 多余 (duō yú), defined as: superfluous; unnecessary; surplus.
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 “superfluous”
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 累赘 (累贅) | léi zhui | superfluous; cumbersome; burdensome; a burden; an encumbrance |
| 赘 (贅) | zhuì | (bound form) superfluous; (bound form) (of a man) to move into the household of one's in-laws after marrying; (of the bride's parents) to have the groom join one's household |
| 多此一举 (多此一舉) | duō cǐ yī jǔ | to do more than is required (idiom); superfluous; gilding the lily |
| 浮 | fú | to float; superficial |
| 冗长 (冗長) | rǒng cháng | long and tedious; redundant |
Related words
Other words that share a character with 多余.
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 许多 (許多) | xǔ duō | many; a lot of |
| 多少 | duō shǎo | number; amount; somewhat |
| 多年 | duō nián | many years; for many years |
| 多数 (多數) | duō shù | majority; most |
| 多么 (多麼) | duō me | how (wonderful etc); what (a great idea etc) |
| 其余 (其餘) | qí yú | the rest; the others |
| 余额 (餘額) | yú é | balance (of an account, bill etc); surplus |
| 业余 (業餘) | yè yú | in one's spare time; outside working hours |
See also: Japanese symbol for “superfluous”.
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.