Kanji Kaisen

漢字Kanji · in Nature & Elements

雪: snow

JLPT N311 strokesGrade 2Your ink: 白 Not met

雨 carries the meaning · ⺕ is drawn in

11 strokes
  • Small seal · Qin
  • Today

Small seal: Wikimedia Commons, public domain. Today’s form: KanjiVG, CC BY-SA 3.0.

Two readings, and the words that use each

セツsetsu · on'yomi · in compounds

  • 積雪せきせつfallen snow
  • 新雪しんせつnew snow
  • 豪雪地帯ごうせつちたいarea of heavy snowfall

ゆきyuki · kun'yomi · on its own

  • 雪ゆきsnow
  • 大雪おおゆきheavy snow
  • 初雪はつゆきfirst snow (of season)
  • 雪合戦ゆきがっせんsnowball fight
  • 雪国ゆきぐにsnow country
  • 雪掻きゆきかきsnow plow

Words: Kanji alive, CC BY 4.0.

Learn it 4 steps
Print sheet Present
成り立ち

Where it comes from

Origin · sourced

Phono-semantic compound (形聲)雨 rain (meaning) + 彗 (sound)

Ancient simplification of 䨮, which is in turn phono-semantic compound (形聲): semantic 雨 (“rain”) + phonetic 彗.

Source: Wiktionary, 雪 (rev. 93737678), CC BY-SA 4.0

Memory story · made up to help you remember

“Rain + a broom (⺕) = the white rain that you can sweep away like dust.”
From the 雨 rain story
繋がり
Ink shades, lightest to darkest: 白 Not met, 淡 Met, 中 Learning, 濃 Familiar, 印 Mastered
雨

Also built on rain (雨)

All 13
⺕

Also built on ⺕

15 in all

Also read セツ

11 kanji share this on'yomi

Easy to confuse

The difference, side by side
雪 snow · ⺕
vs雲 cloud · 云
雪 has ⺕ where 雲 has 云.
In ChineseSame character in simplified and traditional · xuě

Same form: 雪 is written the same way in mainland China (simplified) and in Taiwan and Hong Kong (traditional).

Simplified
雪 mainland China, Singapore
Traditional
雪 Taiwan, Hong Kong

Pinyin xuě 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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