坡 (pō) is a Chinese character meaning “slope”. It is written from 土 (earth; soil) and 皮 (skin; hide; leather), side by side, and takes 8 strokes.
Build the character for “slope”
Four steps: break it apart, build it, recall it, use it in a word.
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Structure
土 + 皮
Left–right structure
Structure from: 《说文解字》：坡，阪也。从土皮聲
Memory aid
The left part, 土 (earth, ground), tells you what this character is about: a piece of ground. The right part, 皮 (pí, skin), has nothing to do with skin here — it is the sound part, though the sound has drifted a long way over the centuries: pí → pō. Ground plus a leaning skin: a slope.
This is a memory aid, not the historical origin.
Stroke order
8 strokes
In real words
- 山坡shān pōhillside; mountain slope坡 = pō
- 下坡xià pōdownhill; to go down a slope坡 = pō
- 斜坡xié pōslope; incline坡 = pō
- 陡坡dǒu pōsteep slope坡 = pō
Go deeper
All readings
slope
slope; hillside; sloping ground; slanting
倾斜的地面；山地或路面倾斜的那一段。也指倾斜的样子。 — studyhanzi 编写
Words with this reading
- 山坡shān pōhillside; mountain slope坡 = pō
- 下坡xià pōdownhill; to go down a slope坡 = pō
- 斜坡xié pōslope; incline坡 = pō
- 陡坡dǒu pōsteep slope坡 = pō
Sound component
皮 family diverged
Stroke data: hanzi-writer-data (Arphic Public License) · licenses & attributions
Questions people ask about this character
What does 坡 mean?
坡 (pō) means slope; hillside; sloping ground; slanting.
How do you pronounce 坡?
It is pronounced pō.
What parts is 坡 made of?
土 (earth; soil) and 皮 (skin; hide; leather), side by side. The recorded source is: 《说文解字》：坡，阪也。从土皮聲. Components are the building blocks of the shape; the radical used for dictionary lookup is a separate thing.
How many strokes does 坡 have?
8. You can watch the stroke order on this page, or trace it yourself.
What is the radical of 坡?
土. 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 坡?
Common ones are 山坡 and 下坡. The reading of 坡 is not the same in every word, so each word on this page shows which reading applies.