非 fēi to not be; not; wrong


Made with 8 strokes.
Ancient pictograph of negation 'not is'. Perhaps derived from two wings of a bird back-to-back which is impossible for a real bird.

Sounds same

飞 fēi (fly) ; 啡 fēi (coffee)

Different tone

匪 fěi (bandit)

Radical

Index 175 used in: 匪 fěi (bandit) ; 啡 fēi (coffee)

< Previous radical 174青 qīng Next radical 177革 gé >

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Pronunciation

Sound file kindly provided by shtooka.net ➚ under a Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike License

stroke order for 非
Stroke order for character 非, kindly provided under Wikimedia creative commons license ➚

Proverbs

冰冻三尺,非一日之寒 bīng dòng sān chǐ, fēi yí rì zhī hán It takes time to achieve satisfactory results
今非昔比 jīn fēi xī bǐ The past is not always a good predictor of the future. Things change
口是心非 kǒu shì xīn fēi To say the opposite of what you really think
塞翁失马,安知非福 sài wēng shī mǎ, ān zhī fēi fú The story ➚ is that a man lost his horse but actually it went over the Great Wall and brought back several horses with it. A setback may turn out to be a blessing in disguise.
想入非非 xiǎng rù fēi fēi Let imagination run wild
非驴非马 fēi lú: fēi mǎ A person or place that is neither one thing nor another. Indeterminate or strange combination.