How many distinct Chinese characters each HSK 3.0 level introduces, counted from the real word lists, and a calculator that turns your own character count into a level. Free, instant, no account.
Counting words instead? The HSK vocabulary size tool does the same for word counts.
See which characters carry a text you are readingCounted from the HSK Studio dictionary (11,623 words). Each character is counted once, at the lowest level of the first word that contains it, so every level adds characters on top of the earlier ones.
| Level | New characters | Total to finish | Word list |
|---|---|---|---|
| HSK 1 | 264 | 264 | HSK 1 words |
| HSK 2 | 154 | 418 | HSK 2 words |
| HSK 3 | 280 | 698 | HSK 3 words |
| HSK 4 | 444 | 1,142 | HSK 4 words |
| HSK 5 | 421 | 1,563 | HSK 5 words |
| HSK 6 | 508 | 2,071 | HSK 6 words |
| HSK 7-9 | 968 | 3,039 |
The dictionary does not split HSK 7-9, so that band is one row. These count characters that appear in words, not characters you can write, and they are not an official syllabus figure.
In the HSK Studio dictionary, the words of HSK 1 use 264 distinct characters. Each later level adds characters not seen before: 154 more at HSK 2 (418 in total), then 280 (698), 444 (1,142), 421 (1,563) and 508 (2,071) by HSK 6. The HSK 7-9 band adds 968 and brings the total to 3,039.
It depends on what you read. The HSK 1 to 6 word lists use 2,071 distinct characters, which is the working vocabulary these levels build. The whole dictionary, including HSK 7-9, uses 3,039. Frequency matters more than the count: a few hundred characters make up most of the characters in ordinary text, which the character frequency tool shows for any passage you paste.
No. The counts come from the characters that appear in the words of the dictionary HSK Studio uses, which follows the HSK 3.0 level assignments. The official syllabus publishes its own character lists, and totals can differ from these by some amount.
No. The count is of characters that appear in words you would read or hear, not of characters you can write from memory. Recognising a character and writing it are different skills, and the HSK vocabulary lists do not measure either.
Each character is counted once, at the lowest level of the first word that contains it. 学 first appears in an HSK 1 word, so it counts toward HSK 1 even though it is also inside many harder words.
Paste Chinese you chose yourself into the reader, tap any word for pinyin, meaning and audio, and save the words worth keeping. Free, no account.
Open the readerWord lists by level: HSK 1, HSK 2, HSK 3, HSK 4, HSK 5, HSK 6. All levels.
Same engine, same dictionary, different question. Whatever you pasted here works in all of them.