Kanji Kaisen

漢字Kanji · in Nature & Elements

沖: open sea, offing

Also: rise high into sky

JLPT N17 strokesGrade 4Your ink: 白 Not met

氵 carries the meaning · 中 gives the sound

7 strokes

One reading, and the words that use it

おきoki · kun'yomi · on its own

  • 沖おきopen sea
  • 沖縄おきなわOkinawa (city, prefecture)
  • 沖合おきあいoff the coast; offshore; out at sea

Also read チュウ, おきつ, ちゅうする, わく, with no example words in our sources. Words: JMdict, EDRDG, CC BY-SA 4.0.

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成り立ち

Where it comes from

Memory story · made up to help you remember

“Imagine three raindrops falling—that's sanzui! Whenever you see these three dots on the left side of a kanji, think of water, liquids, or anything that flows.”
More in the 氵 water story
繋がり
Ink shades, lightest to darkest: 白 Not met, 淡 Met, 中 Learning, 濃 Familiar, 印 Mastered
氵

Also built on water (氵)

All 125
中

Also built on in (中)

沖 takes the 中 family's reading, チュウ (chuu).

Also read チュウ

18 kanji share this on'yomiAll 18

Easy to confuse

The difference, side by side
沖 open sea · 氵
vs虫 insect
沖 adds 氵.
In ChineseSimplified 冲 · traditional, as in Japanese · chōng

Japan keeps the traditional form 沖; mainland China simplifies it to 冲.

Simplified
冲 mainland China, Singapore
Traditional
沖 Taiwan, Hong Kong

Pinyin chōng most common reading

Forms and pinyin: Unicode Unihan database (Unicode License v3). Pinyin lists the most common reading, not every reading.

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