How many Characters should I learn to master basic Chinese language?

4 Comments

1. travelenthusiast says:

   August 29, 2009 at 10:12 pm

   depends on your need. Do you want to just speak or read or even write Chinese?

   Spoken Chinese is very different from what you will read in newspaper. The number of characters isn’t that important.

   3000 is pretty good if you know how to make "combinations" using the characters you already know.

   Most beautiful Tang poems are only 20 characters, but they were put together in such a creative way.

   I would recommend you to focus on spoken Chinese at the beginning unless you know why you need to read or write Chinese.
2. paperstarsx3 says:

   August 29, 2009 at 10:12 pm

   5000+ but should know at LEAST 1000?
3. rhcpizno1 says:

   August 29, 2009 at 10:12 pm

   A well-educated Chinese today recognizes approximately 6,000-7,000 characters; some 3,000 of them are required to read a Mainland newspaper. The PRC government defines literacy amongst workers as a knowledge of 2,000 characters, though this literacy could be pretty functional. A large unabridged dictionary like the Kangxi Dictionary contains over 40,000 characters, including obscure, variant and archaic characters; only a quarter are now commonly used.
4. _______ says:

   August 29, 2009 at 10:12 pm

   some 500