昼 — how to write the kanji for “daytime”

昼 (“daytime” and “noon”) is a JLPT N4 kanji taught in second grade in Japan. Its parts: 尺 (“shaku”), strokes 1–4; 旦 (“daybreak”), strokes 5–9, each finished before the next. On its own it is the word hiru, “noon; midday”. Its native reading hiru leads in its common words, as in 昼間 (“daytime”) and 昼過ぎ (“just past noon”); read chuu it forms 昼食 (“lunch”). Chinese reads it zhòu, “daytime”, at HSK 7-9.

Strokes: 9
JLPT: N4
Radical: 日 (“day”)
On: チュウ
Kun: ひる

Stroke by stroke

Horizontal-turn ㇕top leftrightwards → downwards
Horizontal ㇐top leftrightwards
Left-falling stroke ㇒top leftdownwards → down and left
Right-falling stroke ㇏topdown and right
Vertical ㇑leftdownwards
Horizontal-turn ㇕leftrightwards → downwards
Horizontal ㇐leftrightwards
Horizontal ㇐bottom leftrightwards
Horizontal ㇐bottom leftrightwards

Japanese and Chinese

The two models differ in shape, so our comparison does not claim an order; compare the numbered frames yourself (9 strokes in Japanese, 9 strokes in Chinese).

Japanese · KanjiVG · 9 strokes

Chinese · Make Me a Hanzi · 9 strokes

Trace it

Follow the numbers. Tracing help

Readings

On (Chinese-derived): チュウ chuu
Kun (native): ひる hiru
Meanings: daytime; noon
Read hiru: 昼間昼過ぎ昼休み昼前昼寝昼下がり
Read chuu: 昼食昼夜
School year: second grade
Newspaper rank: 1115th of 2,500 (KANJIDIC2)
Korean hanja: 주 ju
Common words: 11 in JMdict

On and kun, explained

Words with 昼

Word	Reading	Meaning
昼食	ちゅうしょく chuushoku	lunch; midday meal
昼間	ひるま hiruma	daytime; during the day
昼夜	ちゅうや chuuya	day and night
昼過ぎ	ひるすぎ hirusugi	just past noon; afternoon
昼休み	ひるやすみ hiruyasumi	lunch break; noon recess
昼前	ひるまえ hirumae	morning; forenoon
昼寝	ひるね hirune	(afternoon) nap; sleeping during the day
昼下がり	ひるさがり hirusagari	early afternoon
お昼	おひる ohiru	lunch; noon
昼飯	ひるめし hirumeshi	lunch; midday meal

Most common first (JMdict).

Practice sheet

Print at 100%. Several kanji: worksheet maker.

Keep going

Same parts:

JLPT N4, in list order: