什么
what; what kind of
HSK level
- Pinyin
- shénme
- Part of speech
- pronoun
- Level
- HSK 1
- Strokes
- 7
- Register
- neutral
- In episodes
- 2
Stroke order for 什么
什么 is written with 7 strokes (什: 4, 么: 3). The animation replays automatically.
What does 什么 mean?
什么 (shénme) is the Chinese question word 'what.'
Three uses cover almost everything: (1) standalone — 这是什么？('what is this?'); (2) before a noun to ask 'what kind of' — 什么书 ('what book / what kind of book'), 什么时候 ('what time / when'), 什么人 ('what kind of person'); (3) as an indefinite 'anything / something' in non-question contexts — 我什么都不知道 ('I don't know anything'). Unlike English, Chinese question words STAY in their normal sentence position — you do NOT move them to the front. 'What are you eating?'
is 你吃什么？ (literally 'you eat what?') — never 什么你吃. The 么 is toneless. The whole word is often pronounced casually as 'shěme' or 'shémo' in fast speech.
Character by character
Hear 什么 in real episodes
什么 appears in 2 Fluentide podcast episodes at natural native speed. Each sentence plays at the easiest difficulty it exists in — switch it to hear the same moment at your level, with full pinyin and English throughout.
中微子很小很小，什么都能穿过：你的手，你的家，你的学校。
Neutrinos are tiny, tiny; they can pass through anything: your hand, your home, your school.
Francis Halzen Wins the Physics Nobel for Turning a Cubic Kilometer of Antarctic Ice Into a Telescope for Ghost Particles
研究，是一直看、一直想，想知道一个东西是什么。
To research means to keep looking and keep thinking, wanting to know what something is.
A Russian Lab Worker Died After a Test Tube Broke at a Plague Institute. Russia Says It Wasn't Plague, but Quarantined 200 People.
Example sentences
你叫什么名字？
Nǐ jiào shénme míngzi?
What's your name?
spoken
这是什么？
Zhè shì shénme?
What is this?
spoken
你想吃什么？
Nǐ xiǎng chī shénme?
What do you want to eat?
spoken
为什么？
Wèi shénme?
Why?
spoken
Common phrases with 什么
Synonyms
啥 is the very casual / northern-dialect version of 什么. Common in spoken speech, especially in northern China. Avoid 啥 in writing or formal contexts; use 什么.
Don't confuse 什么 with
Frequently asked questions
Related words from the same episodes
Acquire it by listening
Meet 什么 again — in real Chinese, at your level.
You just saw 什么 in 2 episodes. Fluentide keeps feeding you news episodes at your level, so this word — and thousands like it — resurface in real sentences until they stick. Full pinyin and translation every time. Free to start.