HSK 3 · Adjectives

聪明 cōngming “intelligent” in Chinese

Traditional 聰明

What 聪明 means

  1. intelligent
  2. clever
  3. bright
  4. smart
  5. acute (of sight and hearing)

How to say 聪明

  • Pitch chart of the first tone: stays high and level, 5 to 5 on the five-level scale聪cōng1st tone, high and level
  • Pitch chart of the neutral tone: short and light, with no contour of its own明mingneutral tone, light and short

Grey pinyin is a neutral tone: say it short and light. More on the neutral tone

聪明 in a sentence

  1. 她不但漂亮，而且聪明。

    Tā búdàn piàoliang, érqiě cōngming.

    She’s not only pretty but also smart.

    Sentence #333469 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

  2. 他没他哥哥聪明。

    Tā méi tā gēge cōngming.

    He isn’t as smart as his older brother.

    Sentence #811281 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

  3. 熊猫很聪明。

    Xióngmāo hěn cōngming.

    Pandas are very clever.

    Sentence #766002 from Tatoeba

How 聪明 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 聪 (cōng) with each of its parts in a different colour
聪cōngacute
  • 耳ear · ěrMeaning part
  • 总to gather · zǒngSound part

耳 hints at the meaning (ear); 总 (zǒng) hints at the sound. Compare it with cōng.

The character 明 (míng) with each of its parts in a different colour
明míngbrightlight in 聪明
  • 日sun · rì
  • 月moon · yuè

Memory aidThe light of the sun 日 and the moon 月 together: bright.

How to write 聪明

聪 15 strokes · 明 8 strokes

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

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

Words related to 聪明

Words with 明

明天míngtiān · tomorrow明年míngnián · next year明白míngbai · clear说明shuōmíng · to explain证明zhèngmíng · proof明确míngquè · clear表明biǎomíng · to make clear发明fāmíng · to invent光明guāngmíng · bright明显míngxiǎn · clear

More words: Adjectives

有意思yǒuyìsi · interesting矮ǎi · short安静ānjìng · quiet差chà · differ from短duǎn · short in length方便fāngbiàn · convenient干净gānjìng · clean更gèng · more

FAQs

聪明 (cōngming) means “intelligent” or “clever”. It is an HSK 3 word.
Say it cōngming: cōng with a 1st tone, then ming with a neutral 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, 聪明 is written 聰明. The pronunciation is the same.
Add a Chinese (Simplified) pinyin keyboard to your phone or computer, type congming with no tone marks or spaces, then choose 聪明 from the suggestions. Typing congming into this dictionary’s search box finds it too.
聪明 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.