Body Parts in Chinese: Head-to-Toe Vocabulary, Idioms, and Saying Where It Hurts
Head is 头 tóu (頭), hand is 手 shǒu, and "my head hurts" — the sentence that makes this vocabulary genuinely worth learning — is 我头疼 wǒ tóu téng. Body parts are core beginner vocabulary for a second reason most lists miss: Chinese builds an enormous amount of everyday language out of them. "Happy" is literally "open heart" (开心), "careful" is "small heart" (小心), and a mobile phone is a "hand machine" (手机). Learn the body, and you've learned the building blocks of half the emotional vocabulary in the language.
- Everyday body words are mostly two syllables: 眼睛 eyes, 耳朵 ears, 鼻子 nose, 肚子 belly. The single characters (目, 耳, 鼻) live on inside compounds.
- To say something hurts: body part + 疼 téng or 痛 tòng — 我头疼 "my head hurts," 我肚子疼 "my stomach hurts." 疼 leans Mainland, 痛 leans Taiwan; both are understood everywhere.
- Paired parts take 只 zhī for one and 双 shuāng for the pair: 一只手 one hand, 一双眼睛 a pair of eyes.
- 心 "heart" is the engine of feeling-words: 开心 happy, 放心 relieved, 担心 worried, 小心 careful.
- Body-part verbs come in fixed pairs worth memorizing whole: 握手 shake hands, 点头 nod, 摇头 shake your head.
Body parts in Chinese from head to toe
Here's the full working list, ordered top to bottom, with traditional forms where they differ. Notice how many end in the noun suffixes 子 or 朵 — those syllables are unstressed, which is why the pinyin shows no tone mark on them.
| English | Simplified | Traditional | Pinyin |
|---|---|---|---|
| head | 头 | 頭 | tóu |
| hair (on the head) | 头发 | 頭髮 | tóufa |
| face | 脸 | 臉 | liǎn |
| eye | 眼睛 | 眼睛 | yǎnjing |
| eyebrow | 眉毛 | 眉毛 | méimao |
| ear | 耳朵 | 耳朵 | ěrduo |
| nose | 鼻子 | 鼻子 | bízi |
| mouth | 嘴巴 | 嘴巴 | zuǐba |
| tooth | 牙齿 | 牙齒 | yáchǐ |
| neck | 脖子 | 脖子 | bózi |
| shoulder | 肩膀 | 肩膀 | jiānbǎng |
| arm | 胳膊 / 手臂 | 胳膊 / 手臂 | gēbo / shǒubì |
| hand | 手 | 手 | shǒu |
| finger | 手指 | 手指 | shǒuzhǐ |
| belly / stomach | 肚子 | 肚子 | dùzi |
| back | 背 | 背 | bèi |
| waist / lower back | 腰 | 腰 | yāo |
| leg | 腿 | 腿 | tuǐ |
| knee | 膝盖 | 膝蓋 | xīgài |
| foot | 脚 | 腳 | jiǎo |
| heart | 心 / 心脏 | 心 / 心臟 | xīn / xīnzàng |
| body | 身体 | 身體 | shēntǐ |
Two usage notes. 胳膊 gēbo is the everyday Mainland word for arm, while 手臂 shǒubì is the more formal term and the usual word in Taiwan. And 身体 means more than "body" — 身体好吗？ is a standard way to ask after someone's health.
Which measure words go with body parts?
Body parts are a compact tour of the measure-word system, because they come in pairs, strands, and shapes:
| Measure word | Used for | Example |
|---|---|---|
| 只 zhī (隻) | one of a paired part | 一只手 one hand, 一只眼睛 one eye |
| 双 shuāng (雙) | the pair together | 一双手 a pair of hands, 一双大眼睛 a pair of big eyes |
| 条 tiáo (條) | long bendy parts | 一条腿 a leg |
| 颗 kē (顆) | small round things | 一颗牙 a tooth, 一颗心 a heart |
| 张 zhāng (張) | flat surfaces | 一张脸 a face |
| 根 gēn | thin strands | 一根头发 a single hair |
How do you say something hurts in Chinese?
The pattern is beautifully simple — no "have," no article: 「subject + body part + 疼/痛」. 我头疼 wǒ tóu téng, literally "I head hurt," is a complete, natural sentence. 疼 téng and 痛 tòng both mean "to hurt": northern Mainland speech favors 疼, Taiwan favors 痛 (我头痛 / 我頭痛), and everyone understands both.
Round out your sick-day survival kit with 不舒服 bù shūfu "unwell," 发烧 fāshāo (發燒) "to have a fever," 感冒 gǎnmào "to have a cold," and one more regional pair: a sore throat is commonly 嗓子疼 sǎngzi téng on the Mainland and 喉咙痛 hóulóng tòng (喉嚨痛) in Taiwan. This is the vocabulary you'll want ready before you need it — pharmacies and clinics are not where you want to be reaching for a dictionary.
Verbs you do with your body
Chinese pairs body parts with verbs into fixed two-character words. Learn them as units — they're among the most common verbs in narrative writing:
Words and idioms built from body parts
This is where body vocabulary quietly takes over the language. 心 "heart" alone generates much of the emotional lexicon; 手 marks skill; 脸/面 carry the entire concept of "face" as social standing. Our corpus bears out how central these characters are: across the 658 graded stories in the Literate Chinese catalog (July 2026), 心 ranks 66th among all characters (404 occurrences), with 手 (110th) and 头 (111th) close behind — largely because they keep appearing inside words like these:
| Word | Pinyin | Literal | Actual meaning |
|---|---|---|---|
| 开心 (開心) | kāixīn | open heart | happy |
| 小心 | xiǎoxīn | small heart | careful; "watch out!" |
| 放心 | fàngxīn | set the heart down | to stop worrying, be at ease |
| 担心 (擔心) | dānxīn | carry the heart | to worry |
| 小心眼 | xiǎoxīnyǎn | small heart-eye | petty, narrow-minded |
| 心疼 | xīnténg | heart aches | to feel sorry for someone; to hate to see something wasted |
| 手机 (手機) | shǒujī | hand machine | mobile phone |
| 拿手 | náshǒu | grasp-hand | to be good at (one's specialty) |
| 丢脸 (丟臉) | diūliǎn | throw away face | to lose face, be humiliated |
| 头疼 (頭疼) | tóuténg | head hurts | literal headache — or "what a headache" about any problem |
Note the pattern: none of these are exotic idioms — they're everyday words a beginner meets in their first months. That's the argument for learning body parts early and then meeting them repeatedly in context. Two free stories in the browser are practically built for it: Blind Men Touching the Elephant is one long exercise in hands, ears, and body words, and Drawing a Snake and Adding Feet explains a famous idiom about unnecessary feet. When those feel comfortable, try reading your first story at your own level, and push the stragglers into spaced-repetition flashcards. For more feeling-words built on 心, see our emotions vocabulary guide.
Frequently asked questions
What's the difference between 眼 and 眼睛?
眼睛 yǎnjing is the everyday standalone word for "eye(s)." The single character 眼 appears inside compounds — 眼泪 tears, 眼镜 glasses, 眼红 jealous — but rarely alone in modern speech. The same split applies to 耳/耳朵 and 鼻/鼻子: two syllables when standalone, one inside compounds.
Is it téng (疼) or tòng (痛)?
Both mean "to hurt" and both are correct. 疼 is the everyday choice in northern Mainland speech; 痛 is standard in Taiwan and common in southern China and in writing. Say whichever your target region uses — 我头疼 and 我頭痛 are the same complaint.
What's the difference between 脚 and 腿?
腿 tuǐ is the leg, 脚 jiǎo (腳) is the foot. English speakers mix them up because "leg" sometimes covers both; Chinese keeps them strictly separate — 我的腿疼 (my leg hurts) and 我的脚疼 (my foot hurts) point a doctor at different places.
How do I say "I don't feel well" in Chinese?
我不舒服 wǒ bù shūfu, or softened: 我有点不舒服 "I'm a bit unwell." Add the specific part with the hurt pattern — 我头疼 / 我肚子疼 — and you can handle most everyday health conversations.
Why does 手机 mean mobile phone?
It's a compound coined from 手 "hand" + 机 "machine" (機) — a machine in your hand. Chinese builds new vocabulary this way constantly (电脑 "electric brain" for computer), which is why single characters like 手 repay learning far beyond their literal meaning.
