Hanzi

The first Great Challenge to learning Mandarin are the characters, called hanzi, which make up the written language.

It’s common to hear that hanzi “look like” the words that they represent. This may have been true in Bronze Age China, but it’s a piece of trivia we pay no mind to.

Here at Daily Mandarin Thread, we assume you are learning simplified hanzi. This is the standard across the People’s Republic of China.

The method Daily Mandarin Thread advocates for is to learn to read hanzi. Writing is a separate skill that doesn’t automatically follow from reading ability. Most writing is done on computers and phones, so being able to hand-write hanzi isn’t as important as it used to be. And so, we consider writing an optional skill for those who are interested.

For daily use, you need to know about 3,000 hanzi. An educated native might know 6,000. Your goal is to learn 1,000 hanzi. This will be enough to get you started reading easy native material.