HSK 6 · Verbs

凑合 còuhe “to make do” in Chinese

Traditional 湊合

What 凑合 means

  1. to make do
  2. to gather together
  3. passable
  4. to bring together
  5. to make do in a bad situation
More meanings from CC-CEDICT
  • to just get by
  • to improvise
  • not too bad

How to say 凑合

  • Pitch chart of the fourth tone: falls from high to low, 5 to 1 on the five-level scale凑còu4th tone, falling
  • Pitch chart of the neutral tone: short and light, with no contour of its own合heneutral tone, light and short

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

凑合 in a sentence

  1. 房间小了点儿，凑合着住吧。

    Fángjiān xiǎo le diǎnr, còuhe zhe zhù ba.

    The room’s a bit small, but we’ll make do.

    Sentence by WillyChina

  2. “最近怎么样？”“还凑合。”

    “Zuìjìn zěnmeyàng?” “Hái còuhe.”

    “How have you been lately?” “Not too bad.”

    Sentence by WillyChina

How 凑合 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 凑 (còu) with each of its parts in a different colour
凑còuto gather together, pool or collect
  • 冫ice · bīngMeaning part
  • 奏to play · zòuSound part

冫 hints at the meaning (ice); 奏 (zòu) hints at the sound. Compare it with còu.

The character 合 (hé) with each of its parts in a different colour
合gě100 ml
  • 亼to assemble · jí
  • 口mouth · kǒu

How to write 凑合

凑 11 strokes · 合 6 strokes

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

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

Words related to 凑合

Words with 合

符合fúhé · in keeping with适合shìhé · to fit合格hégé · to meet the standard required合适héshì · suitable合影héyǐng · to take a joint photo集合jíhé · to gather结合jiéhé · to combine联合liánhé · to combine配合pèihé · to cooperate组合zǔhé · to assemble

More words: Common Verbs

出卖chūmài · to betray处置chǔzhì · to deal with刺cì · thorn伺候cìhou · to serve窜cuàn · to flee摧残cuīcán · to ruin搓cuō · to rub (between the hands)搭dā · to put up

FAQs

凑合 (còuhe) means “to make do” or “to gather together”. It is an HSK 6 word.
Say it còuhe: còu with a 4th tone, then he 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, 凑合 is written 湊合. The pronunciation is the same.
Add a Chinese (Simplified) pinyin keyboard to your phone or computer, type couhe with no tone marks or spaces, then choose 凑合 from the suggestions. Typing couhe into this dictionary’s search box finds it too.
凑合 is an HSK 6 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 written by WillyChina. Character parts and stroke order from Make Me a Hanzi.