HSK 3 · Adjectives

老 lǎo “old” in Chinese

Same in Traditional

What 老 means

  1. old
  2. aged
  3. tough
  4. often
  5. prefix used before the surname of a person or a numeral indicating the order of birth of the children in a family or to indicate affection or familiarity
More meanings from CC-CEDICT
  • old (of people)
  • venerable (person)
  • experienced
  • of long standing
  • always

How to say 老

  • Pitch chart of the third tone: dips low then rises, 2 to 1 to 4 on the five-level scale老lǎo3rd tone, dipping

老 in a sentence

  1. 妈妈比爸爸老。

    Māma bǐ bàba lǎo.

    Mum is older than Dad.

    Sentence #8511069 from Tatoeba

  2. 我老了。

    Wǒ lǎo le.

    I’m getting old.

    Sentence #2411946 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

  3. 我不老。

    Wǒ bù lǎo.

    I’m not old.

    Sentence #10357443 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

How 老 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 老 (lǎo) with each of its parts in a different colour
老lǎoprefix used before the surname of
  • 耂old form of 老 · lǎo
  • 匕spoon · bǐ

Memory aidDrawn from an old person with long hair and a walking stick.

How to write 老

老 6 strokes

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

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

Words related to 老

Words with 老

老师lǎoshī · teacher老人lǎorén · old person老虎lǎohǔ · tiger老婆lǎopo · wife (informal)老实lǎoshi · honest老板lǎobǎn · boss老鼠lǎoshǔ · rat老百姓lǎobǎixìng · ordinary people衰老shuāilǎo · to grow old

More words: Adjectives

简单jiǎndān · simple旧jiù · old可爱kě'ài · cute蓝lán · blue绿lǜ · green满意mǎnyì · satisfied难nán · difficult年轻niánqīng · young

FAQs

老 (lǎo) means “old” or “aged”. It is an HSK 3 word.
Say it lǎo: lǎo with a 3rd tone. Press Listen at the top of this page to hear it, or Slowly to hear each tone clearly.
Yes. 老 is written the same way in Simplified and Traditional characters.
Add a Chinese (Simplified) pinyin keyboard to your phone or computer, type lao with no tone marks or spaces, then choose 老 from the suggestions. Typing lao into this dictionary’s search box finds it too.
老 is an HSK 3 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.