危
Tap the pinyin to hear it
danger; to endanger; Taiwan pr. [wei2]
Formation & memory
Break the character into parts you already know.
How 危 is formed
Ideographic compound (会意字)
A person 㔾 at the edge of a cliff 厃; 厃 also provides the pronunciation
Components 厃 㔾
How to remember it
danger · Heisig RSH #1123
bound up + cliff + fingerprint
Keyword method from Heisig's Remembering Simplified Hanzi.
Words with 危
The most common words first — learning a character in context makes it stick.
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 危地马拉人 | Guatemalan (person) | |
| 危地马拉 | Guatemala | |
| 危重病人 | critically ill patient | |
| 信用危机 | credit crisis | |
| 转危为安 | to turn peril into safety (idiom); to avert a danger (esp. political or medical) | |
| 能源危机 | energy crisis | |
| 道高益安，势高益危 | More moral strength increases one's safety, more power and influence increases one's dange… | |
| 力尽神危 | (idiom) physically and mentally exhausted | |
| 经济危机 | economic crisis | |
| 危机感 | sense of crisis; acute awareness of looming danger or instability (often actively cultivat… | |
| 居安思危 | to think of danger in times of safety; to be vigilant in peacetime (idiom) | |
| 生命危险 | risk to one's life | |
| 危如朝露 | precarious as the morning dew (idiom); fig. ephemeral and precarious nature of human exist… | |
| 临危受命 | (idiom) to take on a leadership role at a time of crisis | |
| 危性 | risk | |
| 危机 | crisis | |
| 危而不持 | national danger, but no support (idiom, from Analects); the future of the nation is at sta… | |
| 安危 | safety and danger; safety | |
| 乘人之危 | to take advantage of sb's precarious position | |
| 金融危机 | financial crisis |
Sound family
These characters use 危 as their sound component — compare how they read.