字 Kanji Decipher

Meaning & readings

expense, cost, spend, consume, waste

On’yomi ヒ
Kun’yomi つい.やす、つい.える

Origin

The character 費 combines a sound hint with a meaningful component. The bottom part, 貝, originally depicted a seashell or precious item and came to represent money or value in Chinese characters — fitting for a word about spending. The top part, 弗, provides a rough sound hint for how to pronounce the character, rather than adding to its meaning. Together, the shape suggests "using up money or valuable resources," which developed into the meanings of expense, cost, and waste.

費 12 strokes

Components

  • 弗 sound hint top
  • 貝 radical bottom

A sound hint component points at the character’s pronunciation, not its meaning — don’t read a meaning into it.

Common words

  • 会費 かいひ membership fee
  • 学費 がくひ tuition; school expenses
  • 経費 けいひ expenses; expenditure
  • 公費 こうひ public expense; public funds
  • 工費 こうひ construction cost
  • 国費 こくひ national expenditure; government spending
  • 私費 しひ private expense
  • 自費 じひ one's own expense; out-of-pocket expense

Related kanji

Same sound component 弗
Same radical

Reference

Strokes
12
Kangxi radical
154
Formation type
Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint)
Grade
Grade 5 (Kyōiku)
Frequency rank
#321 (newspapers)
Former JLPT
level 2
Unicode
U+08CBB