HSK 6 · Work

薪水 xīnshui “salary” in Chinese

Same in Traditional

What 薪水 means

  1. salary
  2. pay
  3. wages
  4. wage

How to say 薪水

  • Pitch chart of the first tone: stays high and level, 5 to 5 on the five-level scale薪xīn1st tone, high and level
  • Pitch chart of the neutral tone: short and light, with no contour of its own水shuineutral tone, light and short

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

薪水 in a sentence

  1. 昨天我收到了薪水。

    Zuótiān wǒ shōudào le xīnshui.

    I received my salary yesterday.

    Sentence #12615499 from Tatoeba

  2. 他赚的薪水是我的两倍。

    Tā zhuàn de xīnshui shì wǒ de liǎng bèi.

    He earns twice as much as I do.

    Sentence #349707 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

  3. 他的薪水低,所以买不了房。

    Tā de xīnshui dī, suǒyǐ mǎi bu liǎo fáng.

    His salary is low, so he can’t afford a home.

    Sentence #5655286 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

How 薪水 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 薪 (xīn) with each of its parts in a different colour
薪xīnfirewood; fuel
  • 艹grass form of 艸 · cǎo
  • 新new · xīn
The character 水 (shuǐ) drawn as one shape
水shuiwater

水 is a single shape of 4 strokes. Learn it whole, then watch its stroke order below.

Memory aidDrawn from flowing water.

How to write 薪水

薪 16 strokes · 水 4 strokes

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

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

Words related to 薪水

Words with 水

More words: Work & Career

FAQs

薪水 (xīnshui) means “salary” or “pay”. It is an HSK 6 word.
Say it xīnshui: xīn with a 1st tone, then shui with a neutral tone. Press Listen at the top of this page to hear it, or Slowly to hear each tone clearly.
Yes. 薪水 is written the same way in Simplified and Traditional characters.
Add a Chinese (Simplified) pinyin keyboard to your phone or computer, type xinshui with no tone marks or spaces, then choose 薪水 from the suggestions. Typing xinshui into this dictionary’s search box finds it too.
薪水 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 from Tatoeba (CC BY 2.0 FR). Character parts and stroke order from Make Me a Hanzi.