HSK 6 · Ideas

起伏 qǐfú “to rise and fall” in Chinese

Same in Traditional

What 起伏 means

  1. to rise and fall
  2. ups and downs
  3. to move up and down
  4. to undulate

How to say 起伏

  • Pitch chart of the third tone: dips low then rises, 2 to 1 to 4 on the five-level scale起qǐ3rd tone, dipping
  • Pitch chart of the second tone: rises from mid to high, 3 to 5 on the five-level scale伏fú2nd tone, rising

起伏 in a sentence

  1. 人生充满了高低起伏。

    Rénshēng chōngmǎn le gāodī qǐfú.

    Life is full of ups and downs.

    Sentence #798234 from Tatoeba · converted to simplified characters

  2. 生活中有高低起伏。

    Shēnghuó zhōng yǒu gāodī qǐfú.

    Life has its ups and downs.

    Sentence #771994 from Tatoeba · translation adapted

How 起伏 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 起 (qǐ) with each of its parts in a different colour
起qǐto rise
  • 走walk · zǒuMeaning part
  • 己self · jǐSound part

走 hints at the meaning (walk); 己 (jǐ) hints at the sound. Compare it with qǐ.

The character 伏 (fú) with each of its parts in a different colour
伏fúto lean over
  • 亻person form of 人 · rén
  • 犬dog · quǎn

How to write 起伏

起 10 strokes · 伏 6 strokes

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

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

Words related to 起伏

Words with 起

对不起duìbuqǐ · sorry一起yìqǐ · together起床qǐchuáng · to get up起qǐ · to rise起飞qǐfēi · take off in an aeroplane起来qǐlai · beginning or continuing an action引起yǐnqǐ · to give rise to看不起kànbuqǐ · to look down upon了不起liǎobuqǐ · amazing起初qǐchū · at first

Words with 伏

埋伏máifu · to lie in ambush

More words: Ideas & Concepts

潜力qiánlì · potential前提qiántí · premise潜移默化qiányímòhuà · to influence subtly over time窍门qiàomén · knack情理qínglǐ · reason倾向qīngxiàng · tendency情形qíngxing · situation气势qìshì · momentum

FAQs

起伏 (qǐfú) means “to rise and fall” or “ups and downs”. It is an HSK 6 word.
Say it qǐfú: qǐ with a 3rd tone, then fú with a 2nd tone. Press Listen at the top of this page to hear it, or Slowly to hear each tone clearly.
Yes. 起伏 is written the same way in Simplified and Traditional characters.
Add a Chinese (Simplified) pinyin keyboard to your phone or computer, type qifu with no tone marks or spaces, then choose 起伏 from the suggestions. Typing qifu into this dictionary’s search box finds it too.
起伏 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.