DICTIONARY · CC-CEDICT
活
Mandarin · pinyin huó
Meanings
- to live
- alive
- living
- work
- workmanship
Characters in this entry
- 活
- huó · live, exist, survive; lively
Explore the spelling
Mandarin tones
2 · huo2
Compare attested words with these syllables ↗Dictionary tones. Connected speech can change their realization.
Connected dictionary
1character link4same-tone records
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.
Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 17 senses · 2 Cantonese readings
Rime Cantonese 粵拼
kut3 · wut6
Cantonese word readings for 活. This lexicon supplies readings, not definitions.
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Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section
Independent source senses for this spelling, with usage labels retained. Not matched to the pronunciation above.
character · Etymology 1
- to live; to exist
- life; existence
- to make live; to provide food for
- having life; live
- lively; vivid
- flexible; movable; moving; nimble; agile
- flexible; adaptable; fluid
- job; work
- job; work — act of performance
- job; work — (informal) act of sexual intercourse
- job; work — product; produce
- simply; exactly
- alive; living; in a living state
- to save (a person's life)
- (Mainland China Hokkien, emphasis in exclamations) so; how; what
- (Mainland China Hokkien, in rhetorical questions) awful; unable to handle (used after either 會 /会 or 𣍐 /𫧃 to mean the same thing)
character · Etymology 2
- (obsolete on its own in Standard Chinese) only used in 活活 (guōguō)
Source page · dump 2026-09-02 · Contributors & history
Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0 · source & license · Data pack