Two Radical (二) — Characters, Meaning and Practice Worksheet
二 is the two radical. It appears in 17 of the most common Chinese characters — these 12 are the ones worth learning first, and the worksheet below gives every one of them a pinyin header, a stroke-by-stroke model and blank Tianzige grids to copy into.
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What does 二 mean?
Two radical · 二 èr · 2 strokes · two; a pair of horizontal lines
It usually appears at the top or bottom of the character. The Origin column below shows what each character's parts do — many take their meaning from the radical, some take their sound from the other half.
Shapes: 二
二 itself: Two parallel lines; compare 一 (one) and 三 (three)
12 common characters with 二
Ranked by how often they appear in real written Chinese. Every character links to its own page with a stroke-order animation and example words.
| Character | Pinyin | Meaning | Origin |
|---|---|---|---|
| 于 | yú | [indicating time, location, direction, etc.] in, at | |
| 些 | xiē | some, an amount of | 此 supplies the sound |
| 三 | sān | three | Three parallel lines; compare 一 (one) and 二 (two) |
| 目 | mù | eye; list | An eye drawn on its side |
| 月 | yuè | moon; month | A crescent moon |
| 五 | wǔ | five | Five elements (the cross with the extra stroke) between heaven 一 and earth 一 |
| 元 | yuán | [Chinese currency unit] yuan | A man 儿 with two lines emphasizing their head 二 |
| 言 | yán | speech, word | A tongue sticking out of a mouth 口 |
| 示 | shì | show | An altar |
| 互 | hù | mutually, each other | Two hooks hooking eachother |
| 云 | yún | cloud | A cloud |
| 耳 | ěr | ear | An ear |
Related Radicals
- 丶Dot radical · zhǔ22 common characters · a single dot
- 丿Slash radical · piě24 common characters · a downward-left slash
- 乚Second radical · yǐ18 common characters · second (of the heavenly stems); a swallow in flight
- 亠Lid radical26 common characters · the dot-and-line “lid” on top of a character
- 亻Person radical · rén115 common characters · person; people
- 儿Legs radical · ér10 common characters · son; a pair of legs
Create Your Own Chinese Worksheet
The download above is fixed; the generator is not. Turn any character list, sentence or textbook section into a printable worksheet — grid style, paper size and header are yours to pick.