要 · yào
necessary, essential; necessity
Meanings & readings
Meaning & readings
necessary, essential; necessity
- Mandarin
- yào
- Cantonese
- jiu3
Unihan definitions and selected character readings. Read the word to establish its pronunciation in context.
Readings in Japanese, Korean & Vietnamese
Readings recorded for 要 in other language traditions. These are character-level records, not word translations or interchangeable pronunciations.
Japanese 日本語
Grouped by the source’s kana notation; no frequency ranking is implied.
On’yomi · katakana
Kun’yomi · hiragana
Katakana generally indicates on’yomi; hiragana generally indicates kun’yomi. The source does not identify everyday, rare, historical or name use per reading. Kana strings are preserved, including any written endings; consult a Japanese word entry for actual use.
Go deeperJisho ↗Wiktionary ↗
Source record & scope
Unicode Unihan 17.0.0 · kJapanese ↗ · provisional property
ヨウ いる かなめ こし むかえる もとめるKorean 한국어
Hanja readings · Hangul
Source codes are separated below. They are neither sounds nor tones; a character reading alone does not specify a whole word’s pronunciation.
Go deeperNaver Hanja ↗Wiktionary ↗
Reading sources explained
- 요
- KS X 1001 (0) · Educational Hanja (E)
Vietnamese Tiếng Việt
Character readings · Quốc ngữ
Vietnamese readings associated with this Han character. This field alone does not establish word meanings, current usage, or a complete account of Hán-Nôm reading traditions.
Go deeperHán Việt (Thi Viện) ↗Wiktionary ↗
Form & structure
Writing & identity
- Unicode
- U+8981
- Radical
- 襾 · 146
- Strokes
- 9 · Unihan
- Residual
- 3
Source record · Unihan 17.0. Individual senses and historical claims have not yet been reviewed by zimai.
Stroke order
9 strokesModern stroke order; regional conventions can differ. Stroke medians: Make Me a Hanzi via HanziLookupJS, drawn as an even pen line.
Graphical structure
How to read these symbols
⿰ left–right · ⿱ above–below · ⿻ overlap. Dotted boxes indicate positions, not missing characters. Each symbol describes the components that follow it; nested symbols describe a component in more detail. Source codes identify alternative analyses, not a writing sequence or an etymology.
BabelStone IDS · 2025-06-27. Region tags are preserved; 〾 marks approximation and {n} identifies an unencoded source component. These describe graphical structure, not historical derivation.
Words & connections
Words using 要
Character connections
1 catalogue records include this shape in their first retained IDS. Graphical containment does not imply shared etymology.
Component roles · attributed
- 女 sound component · CJKVI analysis
Source analysis · 女聲
Line 6596 · ⿱襾女 · 女聲
Source analyses, kept separate from modern IDS. CJKVI labels are not individually verified historical conclusions. Evidence & limits ↗
Follow this component
Reverse links to attributed component analyses. Open each character for its role, source and words. Shared components do not establish word ancestry.
Sentence context · 2 matches
要是你来得了，那就太好了。
Source, contributors & licenses
Mandarin: Tatoeba #400590 · Original contributor: FeuDRenais · CC BY 2.0 FR · Attribution log · Current owner: GlossaMatik
English: Tatoeba #400587 · Original contributor: FeuDRenais · CC BY 2.0 FR · Attribution log · Current owner: CM
Source text unchanged. Original contributor and text editors are credited from the source log, separately from the current owner.
History & distinctions
Related forms
No simplified/traditional variant property is retained for this record.
Historical readings
- Middle Chinese
- 'jiew · 於霄 反切 · #676
- Middle Chinese
- 'jiewH · 於笑 反切 · #2769
Guangyun-based transcriptions · PHONO-ML · CC BY 4.0. These describe historical reading categories, not modern word pronunciation.
Source row & reading categories
CSV line 5479 · 'jiew = 效開三平宵影 · 'jiewH = 效開三去宵影
Automatically generated in the source dataset; the authors checked a subset and acknowledge possible errors. All source readings are retained separately. Notation & method ↗
Sources & reference
Evidence & next depth
Retained Unihan properties
- kMandarin
- yào
- kCantonese
- jiu3
- kDefinition
- necessary, essential; necessity
- kTotalStrokes
- 9
- kRSUnicode
- 146.3
- kGradeLevel
- 1
- kTGH
- 2013:1441
Readings across dictionaries
- Hanyu Da Zidian
- yāo,yào,yǎo 42805.080
- Xiandai Hanyu · 1983
- yāo 1339.040 · yào 1343.020
- Tongyong Guifan · 2013
- yāo 427.050 · yào 428.120
- Reading counts · XDHYPLCD
- yào(8645) yāo(456)
- Mandarin / Cantonese · SMSZD
- yào粵jiu3 yāo粵jiu1
Reference desk
- Fanqie spellings
- 於霄 於笑
- Kangxi positions
- 1128.160
- Guangyun positions
- 150.15 413.57
- GSR references
- 1142a
- Cangjie
- MWV
- Four-corner
- 1040.4