艰 (jiān) is a Chinese character meaning “difficult”. It is written from 又 (again) and 艮 (gèn — Kangxi radical 138; the trigram for mountain, also "stubborn"), side by side, and takes 8 strokes.
Build the character for “difficult”
Four steps: break it apart, build it, recall it, use it in a word.
StartLearn this character
Structure
又 + 艮
Left–right structure
- 又 again · yòu simplified form
- 艮 gèn — Kangxi radical 138; the trigram for mountain, also "stubborn" · gèn unknown
Structure from: modern-glyph split verified against hanzi-writer-data strokes (又 2 + 艮 6 = 8)
Memory aid
Again (又) and again you run into the stubborn mountain (艮) and it will not move. That stuck feeling is 艰 — hard going.
This is a memory aid, not the historical origin.
Stroke order
8 strokes
In real words
- 艰难jiān nándifficult; hard; tough艰 = jiān
- 艰苦jiān kǔarduous; harsh (conditions)艰 = jiān
Go deeper
All readings
difficult
difficult; hard; arduous
困难；不容易。 — studyhanzi 编写
Words with this reading
- 艰难jiān nándifficult; hard; tough艰 = jiān
- 艰苦jiān kǔarduous; harsh (conditions)艰 = jiān
Stroke data: hanzi-writer-data (Arphic Public License) · licenses & attributions
Questions people ask about this character
What does 艰 mean?
艰 (jiān) means difficult; hard; arduous.
How do you pronounce 艰?
It is pronounced jiān.
What parts is 艰 made of?
又 (again) and 艮 (gèn — Kangxi radical 138; the trigram for mountain, also "stubborn"), side by side. The recorded source is: modern-glyph split verified against hanzi-writer-data strokes (又 2 + 艮 6 = 8). Components are the building blocks of the shape; the radical used for dictionary lookup is a separate thing.
How many strokes does 艰 have?
8. You can watch the stroke order on this page, or trace it yourself.
What is the radical of 艰?
又. 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 艰?
Common ones are 艰难 and 艰苦. The reading of 艰 is not the same in every word, so each word on this page shows which reading applies.