米
rice (uncooked); meter
mǐ
What does 米 mean?
米 (mǐ) covers two everyday meanings English keeps separate. First, it is the noun for 'rice' in its uncooked, grain form — what you buy in a bag at the store. Cooked rice ready to eat is 米饭 (mǐfàn). Second, 米 is the standard SI unit 'meter' for length: 一米 = one meter, 一百米 = one hundred meters.
Context tells you which is meant — nobody confuses 一袋米 ('a bag of rice') with 一米 ('one meter'). 米 also appears in compounds for related foods (玉米 'corn,' 大米 'white rice as a commodity,' 糯米 'glutinous rice') and for measurement (公里 'kilometer,' 厘米 'centimeter'). The character itself is a pictograph of grains separated by lines on a winnowing board — one of the oldest characters in Chinese.
Character breakdown
rice grain (pictograph); meter (unit)
Memory hook: The character 米 looks like grains of rice scattered around a central cross — and it is exactly that pictograph.
Measure word for 米
Example sentences
我家每天都吃米饭。
Wǒ jiā měi tiān dōu chī mǐfàn.
My family eats rice every day.
spoken
请帮我买一袋米。
Qǐng bāng wǒ mǎi yí dài mǐ.
Please help me buy a bag of rice.
spoken
这条路有五百米长。
Zhè tiáo lù yǒu wǔbǎi mǐ cháng.
This road is 500 meters long.
neutral
他跑一百米只用了十二秒。
Tā pǎo yìbǎi mǐ zhǐ yòng le shí'èr miǎo.
He ran 100 meters in only twelve seconds.
neutral
南方人爱吃米，北方人爱吃面。
Nánfāng rén ài chī mǐ, běifāng rén ài chī miàn.
Southerners love rice; northerners love noodles.
neutral
Common phrases with 米
Synonyms
米饭 is 'cooked rice,' the dish on your plate. 米 by itself usually means the raw grain you buy in a bag. At a restaurant ask for 米饭, not 米.
大米 specifically refers to white rice as a commodity (the kind you cook). 米 is the broader word and can mean any rice grain or the meter unit. Stores label sacks 大米.