Learn Chinese Characters

Pinyin Syllable

Chinese characters pronounced pen

Learn common Chinese characters pronounced pen, including 喷 pēn / pèn, 盆 pén. Compare tones, meanings, traditional forms, words, and example sentences.

How to Pronounce This Syllable

For pen, push a small puff of air on p, join it to en, and hold the tone over the whole syllable.

Initial p

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

Final en

Keep the ending light and nasal.

Study Tip

Start with the most common characters (喷 pēn / pèn, 盆 pén) and lock in their tones. 2 common characters share the sound pen, so lean on words to tell the rest apart.

Learn by Tone

pen turns up here with 2 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: 喷 (1 in total). Lock this tone in your ear before the meaning.

2nd tone

Taking the 2nd tone here: 盆 (1 in total). Lock this tone in your ear before the meaning.

Common Words With This Sound

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

Characters

2 common characters in this group.