Learn Chinese Characters

Pinyin Syllable

Chinese characters pronounced guan

Learn common Chinese characters pronounced guan, including 关 guān, 管 guǎn, 观 guān / guàn, 官 guān, 馆 guǎn. Compare tones, meanings, traditional forms, words…

How to Pronounce This Syllable

For guan, start on g and let it run into uan without pausing; keep the mouth moving and hold the tone to the end.

Initial g

Start the syllable on the initial g, then run straight into the final uan — keep them joined instead of sounding out separate English letters.

Final uan

Settle the final uan into a steady mouth shape first, then lay the tone on top.

Study Tip

Start with the most common characters (关 guān, 管 guǎn, 观 guān / guàn, 官 guān, 馆 guǎn) and lock in their tones. 10 common characters share the sound guan, so lean on words to tell the rest apart.

Learn by Tone

guan turns up here with 3 different tones; a change of tone usually means a different character, so the groups below are split by tone.

1st tone

Taking the 1st tone here: 关, 观, 官… (4 in total). Lock this tone in your ear before the meaning.

3rd tone

Taking the 3rd tone here: 管, 馆 (2 in total). Lock this tone in your ear before the meaning.

4th tone

Taking the 4th tone here: 惯, 贯, 灌… (4 in total). Lock this tone in your ear before the meaning.

Common Words With This Sound

Seeing guan inside whole words makes it clear which character is meant — here are common ones.

Characters

10 common characters in this group.