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Dark

On’yomiまい・ばい
Kun’yomiくら.い・むさぼ.る
MeaningsDark, Foolish
9 strokes Secondary school Radical sun
書き順 · Stroke order

How to write 昧

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

9 strokes
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分解 · What it is made of

The parts of 昧

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

部首 · Radical

The radical of 昧

Radical 72 of 214
Sun

The radical is the part a paper dictionary files a kanji under, and it usually hints at meaning. 昧 is filed under (sun) — radical number 72 of the 214 in the Kangxi system.

Other kanji built on 日

練習 · Practice

Drill 昧 right now

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Dark まい・ばい くら.い・むさぼ.る
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熟語 · In real words

Words that use 昧

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.

曖昧 あいまい vague; ambiguous; unclear
あい昧 あいまい vague; ambiguous; unclear
三昧 さんまい samadhi (state of intense concentration achieved through meditation); being immersed in; b
愚昧 グマイ stupid
昧爽 マイソー dawn
蒙昧 モーマイ ignorance, (lack of) enlightenment or civilization (civilisation), unenlightened, uncivili
三昧耶 サンマヤ time; meeting, coming together; equality, warning, or riddance of hindrances (esp. in esot
同音 · Sound-alikes

Kanji that sound like 昧

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

画数 · 9 strokes

Other 9-stroke kanji

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

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質問 · Questions

About the kanji 昧

What does the kanji 昧 mean?

昧 means Dark, Foolish.

How do you read the kanji 昧?

昧 is read on'yomi (Chinese-derived) まい、ばい; kun'yomi (native Japanese) くら.い、むさぼ.る.

How many strokes does 昧 have?

昧 is written with 9 strokes. The animated diagram on this page shows the correct order.

What level is the kanji 昧?

Japanese schoolchildren learn it in secondary school.

What is the radical of 昧?

The radical of 昧 is 日 (sun), radical number 72 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 昧 made of?

昧 is built from 日 (day) and 未 (un-). Learning kanji as combinations of a few hundred reusable components is far more efficient than memorising each character as a separate shape.

What words use the kanji 昧?

Common words written with 昧 include 曖昧 (あいまい, vague; ambiguous; unclear); あい昧 (あいまい, vague; ambiguous; unclear); 三昧 (さんまい, samadhi (state of intense concentration achieved through meditation); being immersed in; b).

Which kanji sound the same as 昧?

昧 shares a reading with 米 (まい), 売 (ばい), 毎 (まい), 買 (ばい), 倍 (ばい), among others. Same-sounding kanji are one of the most common sources of confusion in Japanese.

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