HSK 5 · Adjectives

艰苦 jiānkǔ “difficult” in Chinese

Traditional 艱苦

What 艰苦 means

  1. difficult
  2. hard
  3. arduous

How to say 艰苦

  • Pitch chart of the first tone: stays high and level, 5 to 5 on the five-level scale艰jiān1st tone, high and level
  • Pitch chart of the third tone: dips low then rises, 2 to 1 to 4 on the five-level scale苦kǔ3rd tone, dipping

艰苦 in a sentence

  1. 生活很艰苦。

    Shēnghuó hěn jiānkǔ.

    Life is very hard.

    Sentence #6132212 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

  2. 不管训练多么艰苦，她都没有哭过。

    Bùguǎn xùnliàn duōme jiānkǔ, tā dōu méiyǒu kūguo.

    No matter how hard the training was, she never cried.

    Sentence #3035567 from Tatoeba

  3. 他们不怕艰苦的工作。

    Tāmen búpà jiānkǔ de gōngzuò.

    They’re not afraid of hard work.

    Sentence #868477 from Tatoeba · converted to simplified characters

How 艰苦 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 艰 (jiān) with each of its parts in a different colour
艰jiāndifficult
  • 又again · yòu
  • 艮stopping · gěnMeaning part

艮 hints at the meaning (stopping); 堇 (jǐn) hints at the sound. Compare it with jiān.

The character 苦 (kǔ) with each of its parts in a different colour
苦kǔbitter
  • 艹grass form of 艸 · cǎoMeaning part
  • 古old · gǔSound part

艹 hints at the meaning (grass); 古 (gǔ) hints at the sound. Compare it with kǔ.

How to write 艰苦

艰 8 strokes · 苦 8 strokes

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

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

Words related to 艰苦

Words with 艰

艰巨jiānjù · arduous艰难jiānnán · difficult

Words with 苦

苦kǔ · bitter辛苦xīnkǔ · exhausting刻苦kèkǔ · hardworking痛苦tòngkǔ · pain吃苦chīkǔ · to endure hardship苦涩kǔsè · bitter苦尽甘来kǔjìngānlái · after hardship comes happiness

More words: Adjectives

激烈jīliè · (of competition or fighting) intense坚决jiānjué · firm坚强jiānqiáng · staunch艰巨jiānjù · arduous狡猾jiǎohuá · crafty结实jiēshi · sturdy紧急jǐnjí · urgent谨慎jǐnshèn · cautious

FAQs

艰苦 (jiānkǔ) means “difficult” or “hard”. It is an HSK 5 word.
Say it jiānkǔ: jiān with a 1st tone, then kǔ with a 3rd tone. Press Listen at the top of this page to hear it, or Slowly to hear each tone clearly.
In Traditional characters, used in Taiwan and Hong Kong, 艰苦 is written 艱苦. The pronunciation is the same.
Add a Chinese (Simplified) pinyin keyboard to your phone or computer, type jianku with no tone marks or spaces, then choose 艰苦 from the suggestions. Typing jianku into this dictionary’s search box finds it too.
艰苦 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.