HSK 5 · Function Words

忽然 hūrán “suddenly” in Chinese

Same in Traditional

What 忽然 means

  1. suddenly
  2. all of a sudden

How to say 忽然

  • Pitch chart of the first tone: stays high and level, 5 to 5 on the five-level scale忽hū1st tone, high and level
  • Pitch chart of the second tone: rises from mid to high, 3 to 5 on the five-level scale然rán2nd tone, rising

忽然 in a sentence

  1. 忽然天气转为多云。

    Hūrán tiānqì zhuǎnwéi duōyún.

    All of a sudden, it turned cloudy.

    Sentence #797110 from Tatoeba · converted to simplified characters · translation adapted

How 忽然 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 忽 (hū) with each of its parts in a different colour
忽hūto neglect
  • 勿must not · wùSound part
  • 心heart · xīnMeaning part

心 hints at the meaning (heart); 勿 (wù) hints at the sound. Compare it with hū.

The character 然 (rán) with each of its parts in a different colour
然ráncorrect
  • 肰dog meat · ránSound part
  • 灬fire form of 火 · huǒMeaning part

灬 hints at the meaning (fire); 肰 (rán) hints at the sound. Compare it with rán.

Memory aidFire 灬 under meat 肰. Its first meaning was “to burn”, now written 燃 (rán).

How to write 忽然

忽 8 strokes · 然 12 strokes

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

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

Words related to 忽然

Words with 忽

忽视hūshì · to neglect忽略hūlüè · to overlook疏忽shūhu · to neglect

Words with 然

虽然suīrán · although当然dāngrán · of course突然tūrán · sudden然后ránhòu · then自然zìrán · nature既然jìrán · since竟然jìngrán · unexpectedly然而rán'ér · however仍然réngrán · still必然bìrán · inevitable

More words: Function Words & Grammar

哈hā · ha! (laughter)何必hébì · there is no need何况hékuàng · let alone或许huòxǔ · perhaps基本jīběn · basic急忙jímáng · hastily甲jiǎ · first (in a sequence)假如jiǎrú · if

FAQs

忽然 (hūrán) means “suddenly” or “all of a sudden”. It is an HSK 5 word.
Say it hūrán: hū with a 1st tone, then rán with a 2nd tone. Press Listen at the top of this page to hear it, or Slowly to hear each tone clearly.
Yes. 忽然 is written the same way in Simplified and Traditional characters.
Add a Chinese (Simplified) pinyin keyboard to your phone or computer, type huran with no tone marks or spaces, then choose 忽然 from the suggestions. Typing huran into this dictionary’s search box finds it too.
忽然 is an HSK 5 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.