Meaning & readings
negate, no, noes, refuse, decline, deny
On’yomi ヒ
Kun’yomi いな、いや
Origin
The character 否 combines a sound hint with a classifier. The top component 不 (fu/hi) provides a rough pronunciation guide for how the character should be read. The bottom part 口, which normally represents a mouth or opening, acts as a classifier that helps signal the character's semantic category. Together, these components create a character meaning to negate or refuse—essentially the mouth saying "no." The mouth classifier suggests this is about speech or verbal expression, making it fitting for a character about denial and rejection.
Common words
Easily confused with
These look alike but are unrelated in meaning — check the stroke that differs.
Reference
- Strokes
- 7
- Kangxi radical
- 30
- Formation type
- Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint)
- Grade
- Grade 6 (Kyōiku)
- Frequency rank
- #561 (newspapers)
- Former JLPT
- level 2
- Unicode
- U+05426