歪

Mandarin · pinyin wāi#

Meanings · wāi

  1. askew
  2. at a crooked angle
  3. devious
  4. noxious
  5. (coll.) to lie on one's side
Mandarin · pinyin wǎi#

Meanings · wǎi

  1. to sprain (one's ankle) (Tw)
Full entryShow on map

Characters in this entry

歪
wāi · slant; inclined; askew, awry
Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

Explore the spelling

Mandarin tones

1 · wai1

Compare attested words with these syllables ↗

Dictionary tones. Connected speech can change their realization.

Connected dictionary

1character link3same-tone records
Explore word families ↗Compare pronunciations ↗Open character structure ↗
Counts describe dictionary records, not word frequency or semantic similarity. Source identities stay separate.

Read this spelling in Classical texts

Follow a written form into the eight pinned witnesses: Analects, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi, Xunzi, Han Feizi, Sunzi and the Mao Shijing. A match is a place to investigate; it does not prove that a modern dictionary sense fits the passage.

歪 · find source passages ↗

Explore Classical grammar ↗

Compare dictionary sources Rime · Wiktionary

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

me2 · waai1

Cantonese word readings for 歪. This lexicon supplies readings, not definitions.

CanCLID contributors · CC BY 4.0 · source & license · Data pack

Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

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

character · Etymology 1

  1. slanted; inclined; askew; awry; crooked; lopsided
  2. crooked; perverse; improper; evil
  3. (Central Plains and Lanyin Mandarin, Sichuanese) fierce; malicious; overbearing
  4. (Hakka) stingy; miserly
  5. (Fujian Hakka) ugly

character · Etymology 2

  1. (Shanxi, Sichuanese, dialectal Hakka) inferior; bad; fake
  2. (Sichuanese) unreliable; deceiving

character · Etymology 3

  1. (Cantonese) slanted; inclined; askew; awry; crooked; lopsided; distorted

character · Etymology 4

  1. (Teochew, Leizhou Min, Hainanese) slanted; inclined; askew; awry; crooked; lopsided

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

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

歪 · wai1 · wai3
CC-CEDICT contributors and MDBG · edition 2026-10-13 · source lines 60,819, 60,820
Original dictionary · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source & transformation details
Exact source records歪 歪 [wai1] /askew/at a crooked angle/devious/noxious/(coll.) to lie on one's side/歪 歪 [wai3] /to sprain (one's ankle) (Tw)/