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Counter For Cupfuls

On’yomiはい
Kun’yomiさかずき
MeaningsCounter For Cupfuls, Wine Glass, Glass, Toast
JLPT N3 8 strokes #1206 most common Secondary school Radical tree
書き順 · Stroke order

How to write 杯

Stroke order is not decoration — it determines how the character looks handwritten and how dictionaries index it.

8 strokes
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分解 · What it is made of

The parts of 杯

Almost every kanji is built from a small set of reusable parts. Learn the parts once and you stop memorising thousands of unrelated shapes.

radical tree + right negative =
Counter For Cupfuls
Why it sounds the way it does. The part is the phonetic component — it carries the sound rather than the meaning. That is why 杯 is read はい. Roughly two-thirds of all kanji work this way, which makes unfamiliar readings guessable once you spot the pattern.
部首 · Radical

The radical of 杯

Radical 75 of 214
Tree

The radical is the part a paper dictionary files a kanji under, and it usually hints at meaning. 杯 is filed under (tree) — radical number 75 of the 214 in the Kangxi system.

Other kanji built on 木

練習 · Practice

Drill 杯 right now

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Counter For Cupfuls はい さかずき
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熟語 · In real words

Words that use 杯

Kanji are almost never met alone. These are the most common words built from this character, ordered by how often they actually appear in Japanese.

一杯 いっぱい one cup (of); one glass (of); one bowl (of)
満杯 まんぱい full
乾杯 かんぱい cheers; bottoms-up; prosit
賜杯 しはい Emperor's cup; trophy given by the Emperor
駆け付け三杯 かけつけさんばい three cups of sake which latecomers to a party are made to drink
駆けつけ三杯 かけつけさんばい three cups of sake which latecomers to a party are made to drink
苦杯 くはい bitter cup; bitter experience; bitter defeat
祝杯 しゅくはい toast; congratulatory cup
賞杯 しょうはい trophy; prize cup
銀杯 ぎんぱい silver cup
同音 · Sound-alikes

Kanji that sound like 杯

Japanese has far more kanji than syllables, so one reading is shared by many characters. These are the ones you will confuse with 杯 — learn them together, not separately.

画数 · 8 strokes

Other 8-stroke kanji

Useful when looking a character up by stroke count — and a common source of visual mix-ups.

頻度 · Frequency

Next in the frequency list

杯 is the 1206th most common kanji in written Japanese. Learning in frequency order is the fastest route to reading real text.

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質問 · Questions

About the kanji 杯

What does the kanji 杯 mean?

杯 means Counter For Cupfuls, Wine Glass, Glass, Toast. It is the 1206th most common kanji in written Japanese.

How do you read the kanji 杯?

杯 is read on'yomi (Chinese-derived) はい; kun'yomi (native Japanese) さかずき.

How many strokes does 杯 have?

杯 is written with 8 strokes. The animated diagram on this page shows the correct order.

What level is the kanji 杯?

It appears at JLPT level N3, and Japanese schoolchildren learn it in secondary school.

What is the radical of 杯?

The radical of 杯 is 木 (tree), radical number 75 of the 214 Kangxi radicals. The radical is the component a dictionary files the character under, and it usually points at the character's meaning.

What parts is the kanji 杯 made of?

杯 is built from 木 (tree) and 不 (negative). Learning kanji as combinations of a few hundred reusable components is far more efficient than memorising each character as a separate shape.

Why is 杯 read はい?

杯 contains 不 as its phonetic component — the part that carries the sound rather than the meaning, which is why 杯 is read はい. Roughly two-thirds of all kanji are built this way, so spotting the phonetic component often lets you guess the reading of a character you have never seen.

What words use the kanji 杯?

Common words written with 杯 include 一杯 (いっぱい, one cup (of); one glass (of); one bowl (of)); 満杯 (まんぱい, full); 乾杯 (かんぱい, cheers; bottoms-up; prosit).

Which kanji sound the same as 杯?

杯 shares a reading with 配 (はい), 敗 (はい), 背 (はい), 廃 (はい), 排 (はい), among others. Same-sounding kanji are one of the most common sources of confusion in Japanese.

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