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Why copying strokes does not work
Most people copy a character ten times, then twenty. A week later it is gone. On its own, a character is a set of lines with no meaning, and memory is bad at keeping things that mean nothing. It is good at keeping people, objects and small scenes. So turn the lines into a scene.
Characters are built from parts
Chinese has thousands of characters, but most are built from a few hundred parts that come back again and again. Some of these parts are called radicals, and many are characters of their own. Once you know the parts, a new character is two or three things you already know, put together. Take 木, a tree:
| Character | Parts | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 木 | a tree | tree |
| 林 | 木 tree + 木 tree | wood |
| 森 | 木 tree + 林 a wood | forest |
| 休 | 亻 person + 木 tree | rest |
Learn 木 once, and it helps you with every character it is in.
From parts to a story
A list of parts is still dry; a story makes it stick. A good story uses every part and ends on the meaning. Here are four stories from Gushi, a little shortened.
好 (hǎo), good. The parts are 女 woman and 子 child. The woman holds her newborn child for the first time and whispers: "Everything is good now."
明 (míng), bright. The parts are 日 sun and 月 moon. At dawn on the beach the sun rises while the moon is still up, and the surfer squints: "Wow, it is so bright!"
休 (xiū), rest. The parts are 亻 person and 木 tree. After twenty kilometres, a tired person with a heavy backpack drops down beneath a shady tree to rest.
森 (sēn), forest. The parts are 木 tree and 林 a wood. Grandpa plants one more tree beside a wood he planted as a young man, and now his grandkids play in a real forest.
Each story names every part, so it gives you back the shape. It ends on the meaning, so it gives you back the meaning. And it is a scene you can see: when you meet 休 again, you see the hiker under the tree. It works better than copying because it links something new to things already in your head: a person, a tree.
A few rules for good stories:
- Use the same name for a part every time. If 木 is "tree" in one story, it is "tree" in all of them.
- Make it concrete. A tired hiker with a backpack beats "a person resting".
- Keep it short. One sentence is enough.
- Use the real parts. Take the breakdown from a dictionary, not a guess from how the character looks.
Spaced repetition: review just before you forget
A story makes a character easy to learn, but not to keep forever. For that you have to see it again, at the right time.
Spaced repetition is one of the best-tested findings in memory research. You review a card just before you would forget it. Each time you get it right, the next review comes later: after a day, then a few days, then a week or more. Your time goes to the cards you are about to lose, not to the ones you already know well.
FSRS is a modern way to plan those reviews. It learns from your own answers how fast you forget each card, and it picks the day for the next review.
Read 3,088, write 1,200
HSK 3.0 splits the characters in two. For the highest levels you need 3,088 characters to read, but only 1,200 of them to write by hand.
Writing by hand is slow. If you practise writing all 3,088, you spend hours on the part of the exam that needs it least. So learn every character to read, with its story, and practise handwriting for the characters your level asks you to write. The numbers for each level are on the HSK 3.0 hub.
What you can do today
With or without an app, these steps work:
- Pick ten characters from your HSK level or your textbook lesson.
- Look up the parts of each one. In the Gushi lookup, every character has its own page with its parts and its story, for example 休.
- Write one story for each character: one sentence, every part in it, the meaning at the end.
- Make a card for each: the character on the front, the meaning, the parts and the story on the back.
- Review tomorrow, then in three days, then in a week. If you forget a card, start its gaps again from one day.
- Write by hand only the characters your level asks you to write, and only once you can read them.
Which apps help with this, and which do not? The 7 best apps for HSK 3.0 in 2026 compares them honestly, ours included.
How Gushi does it
Gushi turns every Chinese character into a short story built from its real parts. The parts come from the IDS breakdown, a standard description of how each character is put together, so every story is told with the pieces that are really in the character. FSRS schedules your reviews. You can learn all nine HSK 3.0 levels, or follow your textbook lesson by lesson. The first month is free. See the app.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best way to remember Chinese characters?
Learn the parts first, then give each character a short story made from its parts. Review the stories with spaced repetition, so each one comes back just before you would forget it.
Do I have to learn all the radicals first?
No. Learn the parts as they turn up in the characters you study. The common ones, like 木 tree or 亻 person, come back so often that you learn them quickly.
How many characters do I need for HSK 3.0?
3,088 to read for the highest levels, and 1,200 of them to write by hand. Each level's numbers are on the HSK 3.0 hub.
Do I have to write a character by hand to remember it?
Not to read it. A story and regular reviews are enough to recognise a character. Writing by hand helps you keep its exact shape, so practise it for the characters you have to write.
How many new characters should I learn a day?
Five to ten is a good start. Doing your reviews every day matters more, because they keep what you have already learned.
