HSK 3.0 Level 4 · Family

父母 fùmǔ “parents” in Chinese

Same in Traditional

What 父母 means

  1. parents
  2. father and mother

How to say 父母

  • Pitch chart of the fourth tone: falls from high to low, 5 to 1 on the five-level scale父fù4th tone, falling
  • Pitch chart of the third tone: dips low then rises, 2 to 1 to 4 on the five-level scale母mǔ3rd tone, dipping

父母 in a sentence

  1. 让我给你介绍一下我的父母。

    Ràng wǒ gěi nǐ jièshào yíxià wǒ de fùmǔ.

    Let me introduce my parents to you.

    Sentence #1779205 from Tatoeba

  2. 父母爱自己的孩子。

    Fùmǔ ài zìjǐ de háizi.

    Parents love their children.

    Sentence #794235 from Tatoeba

  3. 你依然和父母住一起吗？

    Nǐ yīrán hé fùmǔ zhù yìqǐ ma?

    Do you still live with your parents?

    Sentence #5091274 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

How 父母 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 父 (fù) with each of its parts in a different colour
父fùfather
  • 八eight · bā
  • 乂to govern · yì
The character 母 (mǔ) drawn as one shape
母mǔmother

母 is a single shape of 5 strokes. Learn it whole, then watch its stroke order below.

How to write 父母

父 4 strokes · 母 5 strokes

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

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

Words related to 父母

Words with 父

父亲fùqīn · father祖父zǔfù · grandfather (father’s father)

Words with 母

母亲mǔqīn · mother字母zìmǔ · letter (of the alphabet)伯母bómǔ · aunt (wife of father’s elder brother)岳母yuèmǔ · mother-in-law (wife’s mother)母语mǔyǔ · mother tongue

More words: Family

家人jiārén · family member姐妹jiěmèi · sisters夫妻fūqī · husband and wife爱人àiren · husband or wife

FAQs

父母 (fùmǔ) means “parents” or “father and mother”. It is an HSK 3.0 Level 4 word.
Say it fùmǔ: fù with a 4th tone, then mǔ with a 3rd tone. Press Listen at the top of this page to hear it, or Slowly to hear each tone clearly.
Yes. 父母 is written the same way in Simplified and Traditional characters.
Add a Chinese (Simplified) pinyin keyboard to your phone or computer, type fumu with no tone marks or spaces, then choose 父母 from the suggestions. Typing fumu into this dictionary’s search box finds it too.
父母 is an HSK 3.0 Level 4 word in the official 2021 syllabus, and it is on our HSK 3.0 Band 6 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.