Chinese Mandarin Handwriting for iPhone and iPad

Three ways to find it.

A street sign, a menu, a name in a book: you don’t need to know how to type a character to look it up.

Draw it

Write the character in the box. Six guesses appear as you write, recognised on your iPhone.

Point the camera

Photograph a sign, a menu or a page. The text is read on your iPhone, ready to look up.

Type it

Chinese, pinyin or a Sino-Vietnamese reading. Convert whole texts between Simplified and Traditional, too.

Search results for the reading tự: 字, 自, 寺 and 序, each with its dictionary meaning

The page for 学: reading học, pinyin xué, HSK 1, 8 strokes, radical, dictionary meanings and compounds

One character, every reading.

Meanings, radical, strokes and compounds, with the way it is read across Chinese, Vietnamese, Japanese and Korean.

学

HSK 1 · 8 strokes · radical 子
Traditional 學

Pinyin: xué with audio
Sino-Vietnamese: học
Japanese: ガク gaku · まなぶ manabu
Korean: 학 hak
Cantonese: hok6

Then write it, stroke by stroke.

Watch the stroke order, then trace or write each stroke yourself. Every stroke is checked as you write it, and the character gets a score out of 100.

Try it: write 十 in two strokes1 / 2

Draw the horizontal stroke first, left to right.

Trace, then write from memory

Two misses on a stroke and a hint shows where it starts. Under 70, review the strokes you missed.

Print writing worksheets

A model, tracing cells and empty cells for each character, on 米 or 田 grids, A4 or Letter. Up to 60 characters at a time; preview free.

A daily goal and a streak

Best and last score for every character you have written. Free: 3 characters a day.

One row of a worksheet: the model, two tracing cells, then your own.

HSK 1 to 6, sorted your way.

Browse every level by HSK, radical, stroke count or frequency. Everything you look up stays in History, and your favourites are one tap away.

HSK 1 characters in a grid with their readings — **HSK lists**Grid or list, per level or group.

A Simplified Chinese sentence converted to Traditional — **Simplified ⇄ Traditional**Convert a whole text both ways.

History of looked-up characters grouped by day, with stars for favourites — **History and favourites**Grouped by day, starred for later.

What you write stays on your iPhone.

No account, no sign-up. Handwriting, photos and writing practice are handled on the device; only the dictionary lives online.

On your iPhone

Handwriting recognitionRecognised on the device; the app does not upload your drawings.
Text in photosRead on the device; photos are not uploaded.
History, favourites and writing scoresSaved on your iPhone.

Online

Dictionary lookupsA word that is not on your iPhone yet is looked up in the online dictionary.
DownloadsDictionary languages and the stroke order pack, once.
Ads and app statisticsListed one by one in the privacy policy.

Read the privacy policy

Pay once. Keep it.

No subscription. Everything can be tried for free; buy only the part you need, or Lifetime for all of it.

Feature	Free	Unlock Search	Writing Practice	Pay once, yours foreverLifetime
Ads	Yes	Yes	Yes	None
Lookups	Free lookups, more with a video	Unlimited	Free lookups, more with a video	Unlimited
Dictionary and stroke order downloads	Watch a video	Watch a video	Watch a video	Free
Writing practice	3 characters a day, or 1 hour unlimited with a video	3 characters a day, or 1 hour unlimited with a video	Unlimited	Unlimited
Printing writing worksheets	One video per worksheet	One video per worksheet	Yes	Yes
New features	—	—	—	Every one to come

A video lifts the daily writing limit for an hour, or prints one worksheet; previewing a worksheet is always free. Prices are shown in the App Store; purchases work on every device with the same Apple ID.

See you tomorrow.

明 as in 明天, tomorrow: a new character waits on the Home tab every day.

Download on theApp Store