HSK 3.0 Level 3 · People

大人 dàren “adult” in Chinese

Same in Traditional

What 大人 means

  1. adult
  2. grown-up
  3. grownup
  4. title of respect toward superiors

How to say 大人

  • Pitch chart of the fourth tone: falls from high to low, 5 to 1 on the five-level scale大dà4th tone, falling
  • Pitch chart of the neutral tone: short and light, with no contour of its own人renneutral tone, light and short

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

大人 in a sentence

  1. 你现在是大人了。

    Nǐ xiànzài shì dàren le.

    You’re an adult now.

    Sentence #471372 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

  2. 小孩的体温一般比大人的要高。

    Xiǎohái de tǐwēn yìbān bǐ dàren de yào gāo.

    Children generally have a higher body temperature than adults.

    Sentence #8955190 from Tatoeba

  3. 那个男孩说起话来像个大人。

    Nà ge nánhái shuō qǐ huà lái xiàng ge dàren.

    That boy talks like a grown-up.

    Sentence #342719 from Tatoeba · converted to simplified characters · translation adapted

How 大人 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 大 (dà) with each of its parts in a different colour
大dàbig; large; great
  • 一one · yī
  • 人person · rén

Memory aidA person standing with arms stretched wide: big.

The character 人 (rén) drawn as one shape
人rénperson; peoplelight in 大人

人 is a single shape of 2 strokes. Learn it whole, then watch its stroke order below.

Memory aidA person walking, seen from the side: two legs.

How to write 大人

大 3 strokes · 人 2 strokes

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

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

Words related to 大人

Words with 大

大dà · big大学dàxué · university大学生dàxuéshēng · university student大家dàjiā · everyone大衣dàyī · overcoat大小dàxiǎo · size大熊猫dàxióngmāo · giant panda大夫dàifu · doctor大概dàgài · roughly大约dàyuē · approximately

Words with 人

人rén · person家人jiārén · family member男人nánrén · man女人nǚrén · woman别人biéren · other people客人kèrén · guest有人yǒurén · someone人们rénmen · people老人lǎorén · old person病人bìngrén · patient

More words: People & Family

别的biéde · other员yuán · (suffix) member女生nǚshēng · female student老人lǎorén · old person

FAQs

大人 (dàren) means “adult” or “grown-up”. It is an HSK 3.0 Level 3 word.
Say it dàren: dà with a 4th tone, then ren with a neutral tone. Press Listen at the top of this page to hear it, or Slowly to hear each tone clearly.
Yes. 大人 is written the same way in Simplified and Traditional characters.
Add a Chinese (Simplified) pinyin keyboard to your phone or computer, type daren with no tone marks or spaces, then choose 大人 from the suggestions. Typing daren into this dictionary’s search box finds it too.
大人 is an HSK 3.0 Level 3 word in the official 2021 syllabus, and it is on our HSK 3.0 Band 4 word list. It is not on the older 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.