HSK 6 · Verbs

唠叨 láodao “to nag” in Chinese

Traditional 嘮叨

What 唠叨 means

  1. to nag
  2. to chatter on
  3. to prattle
  4. to chatter away
  5. garrulous
More meanings from CC-CEDICT
  • nagging

How to say 唠叨

  • Pitch chart of the second tone: rises from mid to high, 3 to 5 on the five-level scale唠láo2nd tone, rising
  • Pitch chart of the neutral tone: short and light, with no contour of its own叨daoneutral tone, light and short

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

唠叨 in a sentence

  1. 别唠叨！我需要学习。

    Bié láodao! Wǒ xūyào xuéxí.

    Stop nagging! I need to study.

    Sentence #8871010 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

  2. 我并不想唠叨你。

    Wǒ bìng bùxiǎng láodao nǐ.

    I don’t mean to nag you.

    Sentence #13138161 from Tatoeba · converted to simplified characters · translation adapted

How 唠叨 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 唠 (láo) with each of its parts in a different colour
唠láoto gossip
  • 口mouth · kǒuMeaning part
  • 劳to labour · láoSound part

口 hints at the meaning (mouth); 劳 (láo) hints at the sound. Compare it with láo.

The character 叨 (dāo) with each of its parts in a different colour
叨dāogarrulouslight in 唠叨
  • 口mouth · kǒuMeaning part
  • 刀knife · dāoSound part

口 hints at the meaning (mouth); 刀 (dāo) hints at the sound. Compare it with dao.

How to write 唠叨

唠 10 strokes · 叨 5 strokes

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

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

Words related to 唠叨

More words: Thinking & Talking

空想kōngxiǎng · fantasy口气kǒuqì · tone of voice口头kǒutóu · oral口音kǒuyīn · accent联络liánluò · to contact联想liánxiǎng · to associate (ideas)理睬lǐcǎi · to pay attention to列举lièjǔ · to list

FAQs

唠叨 (láodao) means “to nag” or “to chatter on”. It is an HSK 6 word.
Say it láodao: láo with a 2nd tone, then dao with a neutral 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, 唠叨 is written 嘮叨. The pronunciation is the same.
Add a Chinese (Simplified) pinyin keyboard to your phone or computer, type laodao with no tone marks or spaces, then choose 唠叨 from the suggestions. Typing laodao into this dictionary’s search box finds it too.
唠叨 is an HSK 6 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.