Chinese symbol for “water”
水
shuǐ
water; (after a name) ... River; to swim (used mostly in 会水 (huì shuǐ) and 水性 (shuǐ xìng)); (coll.) lacking in substance; shoddy
The closest CC-CEDICT match for water is 水 (shuǐ), defined as: water; (after a name) ... River; to swim (used mostly in 会水 (huì shuǐ) and 水性 (shuǐ xìng)); (coll.) lacking in substance; shoddy; (bound form) additional cost; extra income; classifier for washings of a garment.
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 “water”
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 浇水 (澆水) | jiāo shuǐ | to water (plants etc) |
| 浇灌 (澆灌) | jiāo guàn | to water; to irrigate |
| 溍 | jìn | water; name of a river |
| 浇 (澆) | jiāo | to pour liquid; to irrigate (using waterwheel) |
| 上水 | shàng shuǐ | upper reaches (of a river); to go upstream |
Related words
Other words that share a character with 水.
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 水平 | shuǐ píng | horizontal; level; a standard; a level (of ability, development etc) |
| 水果 | shuǐ guǒ | fruit |
| 水泥 | shuǐ ní | cement; measure word: 袋 (dài) |
| 洪水 | hóng shuǐ | deluge; flood |
| 水准 (水準) | shuǐ zhǔn | level (of achievement etc); standard |
| 水库 (水庫) | shuǐ kù | reservoir; measure word: 座 (zuò) |
See also: Japanese symbol for “water”.
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.