天

Tap the pinyin to hear it

day; sky; heaven

Sound it out + + =

Formation & memory

Break the character into parts you already know.

Ideographic compound (会意字)

The heavens 一 above a man 大

Components 一大

heavens · Heisig RSH #436

ceiling + St. Bernard dog — as a component also called: heavens

Keyword method from Heisig's Remembering Simplified Hanzi.

The most common words first — learning a character in context makes it stick.

Word	Pinyin	Meaning
白天	bái tiān	daytime; during the day; day; CL:個\|个[ge4]
天气	tiān qì	weather
明天	míng tiān	tomorrow
后天	hòu tiān	the day after tomorrow; life after birth (the period in which one develops through experie…
前天	qián tiān	the day before yesterday
半天	bàn tiān	half of the day; a long time; quite a while; midair; CL:個\|个[ge4]
星期天	Xīng qī tiān	Sunday
今天	jīn tiān	today; the present time; now
昨天	zuó tiān	yesterday
天子	tiān zǐ	the (rightful) emperor; "Son of Heaven" (traditional English translation)
天山区	Tiān shān Qū	Tianshan, a district of Ürümqi City 烏魯木齊市\|乌鲁木齐市[Wu1 lu3 mu4 qi2 Shi4], Xinjiang
天人	tiān rén	Man and Heaven; celestial being
天大	tiān dà	gargantuan; as big as the sky; enormous
天心区	Tiān xīn Qū	Tianxin, a district of Changsha City 長沙市\|长沙市[Chang2 sha1 Shi4], Hunan
天水市	Tiān shuǐ Shì	Tianshui, prefecture-level city in Gansu Province 甘肅省\|甘肃省[Gan1 su4 Sheng3]
天山	Tiān Shān	Tian Shan, mountain range straddling the border between China and Kyrgyzstan
天山	Tiān shān	see 天山區\|天山区[Tian1 shan1 Qu1]
天国	tiān guó	Kingdom of Heaven
天水	Tiān shuǐ	see 天水市[Tian1 shui3 Shi4]
天头	tiān tóu	the upper margin of a page

These characters use 天 as their sound component — compare how they read.

Character	Pinyin	Meaning
天 sound part	tiān	sky, heaven; god, celestial
吞	tūn	to absorb, to annex; to engulf; to swallow
蚕	cán	silkworm
忝	tiǎn	shame, disgrace; self-depreciation