外 — how to write the kanji for “outside”

外 (“outside”) is a JLPT N5 kanji taught in second grade in Japan. In newspapers it is one of the hundred most used kanji (81st). KANJIDIC2 gives it 2 on readings and 5 kun readings, so the word decides how you say it. Its parts sit side by side: 夕 (“evening”, its radical), strokes 1–3; 卜 (“divination”), strokes 4–5, each finished before the next. On its own it is the word soto, “outside; exterior”. Its common words take the reading gai: 外交 (“diplomacy”), 外国 (“foreign country”), 外相 (“Foreign Minister”) and 海外 (“foreign”). Chinese reads it wài, “outside”, at HSK 1.

Strokes

5

JLPT

N5

Radical

夕 (“evening”)

On

ガイ, ゲ

Kun

はず·れる, そと, ほか