Lesson 5 (Unit 2) – 100 Most Common Mandarin Chinese Characters List To Learn Chinese Language

Welcome to Lesson 5 to learn Chinese language online in Unit 2 of SKMLifestyle’s Chinese Language course. So far, in Unit 2, we have learnt 80 new Mandarin Chinese characters (out of the 100 most common Mandarin Chinese characters list). This will be the last lesson for this Unit. I’ll be closing this Unit with 20 new characters and thus completing the 100 characters list that I promised you at the beginning of this Unit 2.

I believe that you have been revising all the lessons (check out all lessons from Unit 1 and Unit 2).

20 characters of 100 most common Mandarin Chinese characters list

Here is the table with the last set of 20 characters for Unit 2. Some of the relevant examples are included after the table. Enjoy!

English	Chinese	Pinyin
But	但	Dàn
Also	还	Hái
Enter	进	Jìn
See	看	Kàn
From	从	Cóng
Decide	定	Dìng
Real	实	Shí
Days/sky	天	Tiān
Good	好	Hǎo
Small	小	Xiǎo
Heart	心	Xīn
Open	开	Kāi
This	本	Běn
She	她	Tā
Only	只	Zhǐ
Minutes	分	Fēn
Because	因	Yīn
Main	主	Zhǔ
Department	部	Bù
Example	样	Yàng

Example of 好, 她, 本

The character 好 (Hǎo) means “good”. It’s made of two individual characters  女 (Nǚ) and 子 (Zi). This character somehow indicates that having two kids (girl and boy) means “good” (女+子 = Hǎo/Good). The character 女 also acts as a “female radical” and is often added to different characters to indicate “feminine” aspects. For example, look at 他 (Tā, he) and 她 (Tā, she). The only difference between 她 and 他 is the extra female radical (女 in 她). Although 他 and 她 are pronounced as same, they have altogether opposite meanings.

How do we say “Hello” in Chinese? Well, the most common Chinese greeting, “Hello” is  你好 (Nǐ hǎo), meaning “you good?” or “are you good?” or simply, “Hello”.

本 (Běn) means “this”. I told you in Unit 1 about the vehicle (车, Chē). If you have to say “this vehicle”, you can say 本车 (Běn Chē). Similarly, “this station” could be written as  本站 (Běn Zhàn).

I have also talked about 小, 天, 小, etc. in Unit 1 and I sincerely hope that you have been revising the previous lessons. 🙂

That’s all in Lesson 5 of the Chinese Language course. I look forward to see you in Unit 3.

You can head to the next lesson of the Chinese Language course or go through the previous lesson again.

You can try the Chinese Language Proficiency Test to test your learning. 🙂

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Happy mandarin Chinese learning.

Last updated: Thursday, March 15, 2018