CANTONESE ↔ ENGLISH · CC-CANTO

分身乏術

简分身乏术 · 繁分身乏術

Cantonese · source Jyutpingfan1 san1 fat6 seot6

to be fully occupied or busy with work

About these definitions

Source definition segments, in their original order. Characters a definition cites are shown without their Mandarin pinyin; classifier lists that CC-Canto copied from CC-CEDICT are marked Mandarin. The community dictionary is not independently verified by zimai.

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Reading & tones

fan11 · high levelsan11 · high levelfat66 · low levelchecked · -tseot66 · low levelchecked · -t

Schematic citation-tone diagrams from the source numbers. These are not recordings or predictions of connected speech.

Same syllable, six tones

fan分fan1to divide 粉fan2powder 训fan3to teach 焚fan4to burn 奋fan5to exert oneself 份fan6classifier for gifts, newspaper, magazine, papers…

san新san1newsan2—san3—神san4deity 肾san5dim-witted 慎san6careful

fat弗fat1notfat2—fat3—fat4—fat5—罚fat6to punish

seot率seot1model for othersseot2—seot3—seot4—seot5—术seot6method

Characters whose customary Unihan reading (kCantonese) is this syllable in each tone, chosen as in the tone atlas (2013 standard level, then the number of CC-CEDICT words they form), with CC-Canto 2017's meaning for that reading; a dash means no catalogue character has that reading. Checked syllables (-p, -t, -k) normally carry tones 1, 3 and 6. Character readings, not word readings; no frequency implied.

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Written characters

分身乏術术

Both source spellings are represented. Written membership is not an etymological or semantic claim.

Cantonese characters and the Mandarin bridge ↗

Mandarin comparison · separate source entries

CC-CEDICT, the Mandarin–English dictionary, lists the same written form:

分身乏術 fēn shēn fá shù CC-CEDICT · Mandarinto be up to one's ears in work (idiom); to be unable to attend to other things at the same time

A separate source entry, shown for comparison. The same characters can carry different senses in Mandarin and in Cantonese; zimai does not align these senses.

CC-Canto includes this pinyin reference: fen1 shen1 fa2 shu4. It does not establish a Mandarin word with the same meaning.

Look up this spelling in the Mandarin dictionary ↗

Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 1 sense

Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

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

phrase

(idiomatic) to be extremely busy that one is unable to handle other things

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

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