HSK 5 · Verbs

咬 yǎo “to bite” in Chinese

Same in Traditional

What 咬 means

  1. to bite
  2. to nip

How to say 咬

  • Pitch chart of the third tone: dips low then rises, 2 to 1 to 4 on the five-level scale咬yǎo3rd tone, dipping

咬 in a sentence

  1. 你的狗咬人吗？

    Nǐ de gǒu yǎo rén ma?

    Does your dog bite?

    Sentence #340699 from Tatoeba

  2. 她有咬指甲的习惯。

    Tā yǒu yǎo zhǐjia de xíguàn.

    She has a habit of biting her nails.

    Sentence #2411919 from Tatoeba

  3. 她咬了一口苹果。

    Tā yǎo le yì kǒu píngguǒ.

    She took a bite of the apple.

    Sentence #844600 from Tatoeba · converted to simplified characters · translation adapted

How 咬 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 咬 (yǎo) with each of its parts in a different colour
咬yǎoto bite
  • 口mouth · kǒuMeaning part
  • 交to connect · jiāoSound part

口 hints at the meaning (mouth); 交 (jiāo) hints at the sound. Compare it with yǎo.

How to write 咬

咬 9 strokes

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

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

Words related to 咬

More words: Common Verbs

修改xiūgǎi · to amend寻找xúnzhǎo · to seek延长yáncháng · to prolong摇yáo · to shake移动yídòng · to move应付yìngfu · to deal with应用yìngyòng · to put to use迎接yíngjiē · to welcome

FAQs

咬 (yǎo) means “to bite” or “to nip”. It is an HSK 5 word.
Say it yǎo: yǎo with a 3rd tone. Press Listen at the top of this page to hear it, or Slowly to hear each tone clearly.
Yes. 咬 is written the same way in Simplified and Traditional characters.
Add a Chinese (Simplified) pinyin keyboard to your phone or computer, type yao with no tone marks or spaces, then choose 咬 from the suggestions. Typing yao into this dictionary’s search box finds it too.
咬 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.