啥 (shá) is a Chinese character meaning “what (colloquial, northern speech)”. It is written from 口 (mouth) and 舍 (house; lodge), side by side, and takes 11 strokes.
Build the character for “what (colloquial)”
Four steps: break it apart, build it, recall it, use it in a word.
StartLearn this character
Structure
口 + 舍
Left–right structure
Structure from: IDS modern glyph decomposition (⿰口舍), verified against hanzi-writer-data strokes 0–2 = 口, 3–10 = 舍
Memory aid
A mouth (口) shouting at the house (舍): "What? What's going on in there?"
This is a memory aid, not the historical origin.
Stroke order
11 strokes
In real words
- 为啥wèi sháwhy (colloquial)啥 = shá
- 干啥gàn sháto do what; what for (colloquial)啥 = shá
Go deeper
All readings
what (colloquial)
what (colloquial, northern speech)
方言、口语，什么。 — studyhanzi 编写
Words with this reading
- 为啥wèi sháwhy (colloquial)啥 = shá
- 干啥gàn sháto do what; what for (colloquial)啥 = shá
Stroke data: hanzi-writer-data (Arphic Public License) · licenses & attributions
Questions people ask about this character
What does 啥 mean?
啥 (shá) means what (colloquial, northern speech).
How do you pronounce 啥?
It is pronounced shá.
What parts is 啥 made of?
口 (mouth) and 舍 (house; lodge), side by side. The recorded source is: IDS modern glyph decomposition (⿰口舍), verified against hanzi-writer-data strokes 0–2 = 口, 3–10 = 舍. Components are the building blocks of the shape; the radical used for dictionary lookup is a separate thing.
How many strokes does 啥 have?
11. You can watch the stroke order on this page, or trace it yourself.
What is the radical of 啥?
口. The radical is how the character is filed in a dictionary — it is not the whole story of how the character is built.
What words use 啥?
Common ones are 为啥 and 干啥. The reading of 啥 is not the same in every word, so each word on this page shows which reading applies.