好

好 (hǎo) is the all-purpose 'good' of Mandarin and one of the first characters every learner meets. As an adjective it describes anything positive — quality, character, weather, taste: 好书 (good book), 好人 (good person), 好天气 (good weather). As a standalone reply it means 'okay / sure / will do' — the way English uses 'sounds good.' It also appears in greetings (你好 = 'hi'), as an intensifier before adjectives meaning 'very / so' (好大 = 'so big,' 好漂亮 = 'so pretty'), and as a resultative complement on verbs meaning 'done / completed' (写好了 = 'finished writing'). One quirk: with a second 3rd tone after it (like 你好), 好 keeps its written tone mark but is pronounced as a 'half-third' tone. 好 is the workhorse word for approval, agreement, and quality in Chinese.

Memory hook: 女 (woman) + 子 (child) = 好 — a mother with her child is the picture of 'good.'

好 appears in 2 podcast episodes at natural native speed, with full Chinese script, pinyin, and line-by-line English translation.