天道酬勤

Mandarin · pinyin tiān dào chóu qín

Meanings

  1. Heaven rewards the diligent. (idiom)
Full entryShow on map

Characters in this entry

天
tiān · sky, heaven; god, celestial
道
dào · path, road, street; method, way
酬
chóu · toast; reward, recompense
勤
qín · industrious, diligent, attentive
Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

Explore the spelling

Mandarin tones

1–4–2–2 · tian1 dao4 chou2 qin2

Compare attested words with these syllables ↗

Dictionary tones. Connected speech can change their realization.

Connected dictionary

4character links
Explore word families ↗Compare pronunciations ↗Open character structure ↗
Counts describe dictionary records, not word frequency or semantic similarity. Source identities stay separate.
Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 1 sense · 1 Cantonese reading

tin1 dou6 cau4 kan4

Pleco · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Word reading; meanings not aligned.

Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

Independent source senses for this spelling, with usage labels retained. Not matched to the pronunciation above.

phrase

  1. (idiomatic) God rewards those who work hard; God helps those who help themselves

Source page · dump 2026-09-02 · Contributors & history

Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0 · source & license · Data pack