Introduction to Traditional Chinese Characters

If you learned Chinese characters in Mainland China, you may be surprised to find that you can't read most of the text you see in Taiwan or Hong Kong. There's nothing wrong with your eyes — the simplified Chinese characters used on the Mainland and the traditional Chinese characters used elsewhere really are different.

Read on to understand exactly how the two writing systems differ, how the split came about, and which one you should learn. Whether you study online or Learn Chinese in China through full immersion, understanding both scripts will deepen your grasp of the language.

01 Traditional vs. Simplified Chinese Characters: What's the Difference?

First of all, "traditional" and "simplified" Chinese refer to the written language only. They do not describe the spoken, or "vernacular," language.

Modern China has many spoken dialects, but written Chinese is not phonetic the way most modern languages are. People in Mainland China today write Chinese characters the same way no matter which dialect they speak.

This means speakers of any of China's hundreds of often mutually unintelligible languages and dialects can write what they say in either script. "Traditional" and "simplified" describe the shape of the characters on the page, nothing more.

02 Where Are Traditional Chinese Characters Used? Taiwan, Hong Kong & Beyond

Officially starting in the 1950s, both the government and ordinary people in Mainland China adopted simplified Chinese characters. People in Taiwan and Hong Kong, however, have continued to use the traditional system to this day.

Most Mainland Chinese immigrants who left before the reforms also still use traditional characters. This is why residents of Chinatowns around the world usually still read and write traditional Chinese. If you are choosing characters for a tattoo, our guide to Chinese tattoos covers popular characters and their meanings.

03 Why Did China Simplify Chinese Characters? 简体 vs. 繁体 Explained

"Traditional Chinese" is sometimes called "unsimplified Chinese." In Mandarin, traditional characters are called 繁体字 (written fántǐzì in pīnyīn).

In the 1950s, Mainland China's communist government began reforming the writing system by simplifying Chinese characters. The goal of these reforms was to reduce illiteracy by making characters easier to learn.

The simplification process reduced the number of strokes needed to write each character, making correct Chinese stroke order quicker to master. The resulting characters are called simplified characters, or 简体字 (jiǎntǐzì).

04 Simplified vs. Traditional Chinese: 4 Side-by-Side Character Examples

Let's look at some side-by-side examples to understand exactly how simplified and traditional Chinese characters differ.

爱 vs. 愛: "Love" in Simplified and Traditional Chinese

Many people cite the character for "love" as an example of a character that changed some, but not too much. Its simplified form is 爱 (ài), while its traditional form is 愛.

爱 愛

Simplified vs Traditional

The biggest difference is that the traditional character includes the character for "heart" (心, or xīn), while the simplified version does not. 心 often appears in characters associated with emotions, which explains its presence in "love."

Supporters of traditional characters often point to 爱 as proof of the script's historical and cultural depth. Studying Chinese etymology reveals many similar stories hidden inside traditional forms.

Many students prefer writing simplified characters because fewer strokes are involved. Others find that the pictographic elements in traditional characters hint at their meanings, which can actually make them easier to remember.

电 vs. 電: "Electricity" in Simplified and Traditional Chinese

Another classic example is the character for electricity, written 电 (diàn) in simplified Chinese.

电 電

Simplified vs Traditional

Here, the traditional character contains 雨 (yǔ), the character for rain, which is absent from the simplified version. The traditional word for electricity contains "rain" because people in ancient times associated electricity with thunderstorms.

开 vs. 開: "Open" in Simplified and Traditional Chinese

"Open," written 开 (kāi) in simplified Chinese, is another interesting case.

开 開

Simplified vs Traditional

The traditional character contains the traditional character for "door" (門), or 门 (mén) in simplified Chinese. This makes sense, since doors are things people frequently open — but in the simplified version, only the easier-to-write middle part remains.

书 vs. 書: "Book" in Simplified and Traditional Chinese

The reformers had more methods than simply removing components. A good example of a less straightforward simplification is the character for "book," written 书 (shū) in simplified Chinese.

书 書

Simplified vs Traditional

At first glance, these two versions look more or less unrelated. Look closely, though, and you might notice something similar about their overall shapes.

That's because the simplified version is based on how calligraphers write the traditional character in 草书 (cǎoshū), an ancient cursive script used in Chinese calligraphy. The cursive form of 書 looks a lot like the modern 书, which explains the origin of this simplification.

05 How Chinese Radicals Changed During Simplification

Traditional characters are often challenging to learn, especially for students who started with simplified characters. This is because the reformers used a wide variety of methods to simplify them.

Luckily, the reformers usually followed general rules when simplifying common radicals. For example, the traditional radical 車 was almost always written as 车 (chē, meaning "vehicle") in the simplified system.

Unfortunately, there's no foolproof way to tell what a simplified character once looked like. It's also impossible to be completely sure of a character's simplified form just by looking at the traditional original.

The good news is that the reformers didn't simplify all Chinese characters. Many characters already had relatively few strokes, so no changes were considered necessary.

Characters that never changed are called 传承字 (chuánchéngzì), or "unchanged characters." Their existence explains why students of simplified Chinese can understand some — but not all — of the characters in a Taiwanese newspaper.

Scroll to the end of this article to see a table of the 100 most common simplified and traditional Chinese characters. The ones that are identical in both columns are 传承字 (chuánchéngzì).

06 Traditional vs. Simplified Chinese in Schools: A Heated Debate

In recent years, the question of whether U.S. teachers should teach traditional or simplified Chinese script has become a heated, often politically charged debate.

Many older teachers and school administrators from Taiwan or Hong Kong argue passionately for continuing to teach traditional characters. They believe these characters possess great historical and cultural value.

Many school officials, students, and parents from Mainland China are equally passionate advocates for simplified characters. They argue that simplified characters are easier and more practical given Mainland China's increasing economic clout.

Unfortunately for the traditional camp, teaching simplified characters is becoming more common in the U.S. In 2007, a Chinese Language Association of Secondary-Elementary Schools survey found that almost 50% of schools taught only simplified characters, while 11% taught only traditional and the rest taught a mix.

Back in 1994, by contrast, 40% of schools taught traditional characters while only 17% taught simplified. The popularity of teaching simplified characters has only increased in recent years.

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07 Should I Learn Traditional or Simplified Chinese?

Which Chinese script you learn really depends on where you plan to spend most of your time. You should also consider how you want to use your Chinese language skills, and how many characters you actually need to learn to reach your goals.

If you plan to work in Mainland China, learning simplified Chinese will most likely be enough. Keep in mind, however, that people on the Mainland still use some traditional characters in certain contexts.

For example, the names of universities, bookstores, historic buildings, and important locations are sometimes written in traditional characters. Business owners and advertisers also occasionally use traditional characters to associate their products with ancient history and culture, making them seem more reliable.

That said, most people planning to live and work on the Mainland find simplified characters sufficient. Simplified characters are also the standard script for the HSK exam, the most widely recognized Chinese proficiency test.

Learning traditional characters might be a better choice if you're planning to work in Taiwan or Hong Kong. It's also valuable if you plan to become an academic specializing in pre-modern Chinese history or literature, since you'll be able to recognize the original characters used in classical Chinese texts.

08 Traditional Chinese vs. Classical Chinese: Are They the Same?

Contrary to what some might think, traditional characters 繁体字 (fántǐzì) and classical Chinese 文言文 (wényánwén) are not the same thing. As explained above, "traditional" and "simplified" refer only to the way individual characters are written.

Both traditional and simplified characters can be used to write modern vernacular Chinese. No matter which script you use, the words and grammar remain identical — only the shape of the characters changes.

Classical Chinese, on the other hand, refers to formal literary Chinese. Writers and intellectuals used this literary language from ancient times until the beginning of the 20th century.

Modern written Chinese is based on modern spoken language. Classical Chinese, however, is very different from any form of Chinese spoken today, and modern writers almost never use it.

Vestiges of classical Chinese are still in use, though. If you've studied Chinese idiomatic expressions such as 成语 (chéngyǔ), you're already somewhat familiar with classical Chinese, since many of these idioms come from classical works.

Modern publishers can present classical literary works in either traditional or simplified characters. Since simplified characters are easier for today's Mainland readers to recognize, many textbooks use them — even though the original authors wrote in traditional characters 繁体字 (fántǐzì) and unchanged characters 传承字 (chuánchéngzì).

09 Useful Vocabulary: Talking About Chinese Scripts in Mandarin

The following terms will help you discuss traditional and simplified characters in Mandarin, and recognize these words in textbooks, articles, and everyday conversation.

10 FAQ: Traditional and Simplified Chinese Characters

11 Final Thoughts: New Insights from an Ancient Tradition

After reading this article, you should better understand the differences between simplified and traditional Chinese characters. Students who started with simplified characters often find traditional characters challenging.

Learning at least some traditional characters is still worth it, though. Studying this ancient form of writing gives you new insights into the historical evolution of the Chinese language — and into how Chinese characters are constructed in the first place.

If you'd like to explore further, check out the table below. It compares traditional characters 繁体字 (fántǐzì), simplified characters 简体字 (jiǎntǐzì), and unchanged characters 传承字 (chuánchéngzì).

The table is a modified version of CLI's list of the 100 Most Common Chinese Characters, based on the work of linguist Jun Da.

12 The 100 Most Common Traditional Chinese Characters (With Simplified Equivalents)

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