HSK 4 · Body

肚子 dùzi “belly” in Chinese

Same in Traditional

What 肚子 means

  1. belly
  2. abdomen
  3. stomach

Measure word 个 gè · 一个肚子 yí ge dùzi

How to say 肚子

  • Pitch chart of the fourth tone: falls from high to low, 5 to 1 on the five-level scale肚dù4th tone, falling
  • Pitch chart of the neutral tone: short and light, with no contour of its own子zineutral tone, light and short

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

肚子 in a sentence

  1. 我肚子饿极了。

    Wǒ dùzi è jí le.

    I’m starving!

    Sentence #400030 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

  2. 我肚子疼。

    Wǒ dùzi téng.

    My tummy hurts.

    Sentence #396056 from Tatoeba

  3. 刚才你肚子一直在叫,没事吧?

    Gāngcái nǐ dùzi yìzhí zài jiào, méishì ba?

    Your stomach was rumbling the whole time just now. Are you all right?

    Sentence #2704935 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

How 肚子 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 肚 (dù) with each of its parts in a different colour
肚dùbelly
  • ⺼meat form of 肉 · ròuMeaning part
  • 土earth · tǔSound part

⺼ hints at the meaning (meat); 土 (tǔ) hints at the sound. Compare it with dù.

The character 子 (zi) with each of its parts in a different colour
子zinoun suffix, as in 椅子 “chair”
  • 了clear · le
  • 一one · yī

Memory aidA baby with its arms out and its legs wrapped up.

How to write 肚子

肚 7 strokes · 子 3 strokes

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

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

Words related to 肚子

Words with 子

More words: People, Body & Health

FAQs

肚子 (dùzi) means “belly” or “abdomen”. It is an HSK 4 word.
Say it dùzi: dù with a 4th tone, then zi with a neutral tone. Press Listen at the top of this page to hear it, or Slowly to hear each tone clearly.
Yes. 肚子 is written the same way in Simplified and Traditional characters.
Use 个 (gè). For example, one belly is 一个肚子 (yí ge dùzi).
Add a Chinese (Simplified) pinyin keyboard to your phone or computer, type duzi with no tone marks or spaces, then choose 肚子 from the suggestions. Typing duzi into this dictionary’s search box finds it too.
肚子 is an HSK 4 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.