HSK 3 · Time

刚才 gāngcái “just now” in Chinese

Traditional 剛才

What 刚才 means

  1. just now
  2. a moment ago

How to say 刚才

  • Pitch chart of the first tone: stays high and level, 5 to 5 on the five-level scale刚gāng1st tone, high and level
  • Pitch chart of the second tone: rises from mid to high, 3 to 5 on the five-level scale才cái2nd tone, rising

刚才 in a sentence

  1. 抱歉，我刚才在吃饭，没有看到信息。

    Bàoqiàn, wǒ gāngcái zài chīfàn, méiyǒu kàndào xìnxī.

    Sorry, I was eating just now and didn’t see your message.

    Sentence #1394998 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

  2. 刚才的话，你可以再说一遍吗？

    Gāngcái de huà, nǐ kěyǐ zài shuō yí biàn ma?

    Could you say what you just said again?

    Sentence #12686149 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

  3. 刚才天气还很好，怎么会突然下雨了呢？

    Gāngcái tiānqì hái hěn hǎo, zěnme huì tūrán xiàyǔ le ne?

    The weather was great just a moment ago. How is it suddenly raining now?

    Sentence #3060477 from Tatoeba

How 刚才 is built

Each colour is one part of the character. Parts repeat across thousands of characters, so learning them makes new words easier. See all 214 in our radicals chart.

The character 刚 (gāng) with each of its parts in a different colour
刚gānghard; firm; strong
  • 冈ridge or crest of hill · gāngSound part
  • 刂knife form of 刀 · dāoMeaning part

刂 hints at the meaning (knife); 冈 (gāng) hints at the sound. Compare it with gāng.

The character 才 (cái) drawn as one shape
才cáiability; talent

才 is a single shape of 3 strokes. Learn it whole, then watch its stroke order below.

How to write 刚才

刚 6 strokes · 才 3 strokes

Watch the order, then press Try writing it and draw each stroke in the grid. Each stroke is checked as you go.

刚才 (gāngcái) stroke order chart: each stroke of the characters in the order you write them
Stroke order chart for 刚才 (gāngcái). Red marks the next stroke, so you can copy it onto paper one step at a time.

Words related to 刚才

Words with 刚

刚刚gānggāng · just now刚gāng · just

Words with 才

才cái · ability人才réncái · talent才干cáigàn · ability天才tiāncái · genius

More words: Time

半bàn · half春chūn · spring season当然dāngrán · of course冬dōng · winter后来hòulái · afterwards几乎jīhū · almost季节jìjié · season经常jīngcháng · often

FAQs

刚才 (gāngcái) means “just now” or “a moment ago”. It is an HSK 3 word.
Say it gāngcái: gāng with a 1st tone, then cái with a 2nd tone. Press Listen at the top of this page to hear it, or Slowly to hear each tone clearly.
In Traditional characters, used in Taiwan and Hong Kong, 刚才 is written 剛才. The pronunciation is the same.
Add a Chinese (Simplified) pinyin keyboard to your phone or computer, type gangcai with no tone marks or spaces, then choose 刚才 from the suggestions. Typing gangcai into this dictionary’s search box finds it too.
刚才 is an HSK 3 word in the HSK 2.0 word lists.

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Sources: meaning and pinyin checked by a native Mandarin teacher against the official HSK lists. Extra meanings from CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0). Example sentences from Tatoeba (CC BY 2.0 FR). Character parts and stroke order from Make Me a Hanzi.