How to Use HanziBook: Complete Guide to Every Feature

HanziBook is a free tool for learning Chinese characters — search any word, watch its stroke order animated, trace it yourself, hear how it sounds, and print practice sheets for offline study. This guide walks through every feature in detail.

The search box at the top of the Learn page accepts three kinds of input, and you can mix them however you like:

好 — the Chinese character itself
hao — pinyin, with or without tone marks
good — the English meaning

All three searches return the same word, ranked instantly by relevance as you type. Click the ▼ Browse toggle below the search box to open a scrollable list of all words — useful when you want to explore rather than search for something specific. You can filter the list by HSK level and category from there.

Stroke-by-Stroke Animation & Practice Mode

Once you open a character, the ✍️ Learn tab shows it large, with writer controls underneath:

  1. ▶ Animate — Plays the character's strokes in the correct order, one at a time, at a comfortable speed. Watch it a few times before trying to write the character yourself.
  2. ✏️ Practice — Switches to quiz mode: trace each stroke yourself, in order, directly on screen. HanziBook checks each stroke and shows "✅ Done!" once you've completed the whole character correctly.
  3. ↺ Reset — Clears your practice attempt so you can try again from the first stroke — useful for repeating a character several times in a row.

Tip: alongside the stroke view, an Image tab shows a themed illustration related to the word's meaning — handy for building a visual association with new vocabulary.

Audio Pronunciation

The 🔊 Listen button plays a native pronunciation of the current word. For longer study sessions, the Repeat word & translation option plays the word, then its translation, on a loop — great for passive listening practice while you review a printed sheet. During lesson review, Repeat lesson cycles through every word in a lesson the same way.

Audio playback is completely free, along with search, stroke animation, practice mode, and PDF export — no sign-up required for any of it.

Printable Copybooks (PDF)

Switch to the 📖 Copybook tab to generate a print-ready practice sheet for the current word. Three modes are available:

  1. Model · Trace — Each row shows a faint model character followed by empty grid squares — trace over the model, then continue writing from memory in the remaining squares.
  2. Free Practice — A full page of empty grid squares with no model — for once you're confident writing the character from memory.
  3. Sound & Meaning Practice — Instead of writing squares, this sheet quizzes pinyin and English meaning — useful for reviewing recognition and recall without writing.

Click 📄 Download PDF to save an A4 sheet ready to print at home or at school — no account needed.

Don't want to print one character at a time? Open the ▼ Browse list, select multiple words using their checkboxes, and export them all as a single copybook PDF in one go. You can even drag selected characters together to combine them into custom phrases or short sentences before exporting — useful for practicing vocabulary in the combinations you actually want to learn.

Lesson Builder (Pro)

The Lesson Builder lets you group words into custom vocabulary sets — for example, "Week 3 vocabulary" or "Words from Chapter 5". Each lesson can have sticky-note reminders and links attached, so notes from your teacher or textbook stay with the relevant words.

Built-in spaced repetition: every time you print a lesson sheet, HanziBook automatically mixes in roughly 20% review words from your earlier lessons — so past vocabulary keeps coming back at increasing intervals without any extra setup.

Switching the Interface Language

Click the 🌐 globe icon in the header to switch between English, Russian, Ukrainian, and Spanish. The interface text, word meanings, and search all update instantly — and the URL updates too (/en, /ru, /ua, /es), so you can bookmark or share a link in your preferred language.

Signing In & Syncing Across Devices

HanziBook works fully without an account — your recent words and progress are saved in your browser. If you'd like to use HanziBook on multiple devices (for example, a laptop at home and a tablet at school), sign in with Google or email using the sign-in button in the header. Your lessons and custom word lists then sync automatically across every device you sign in on.

Tips for Getting the Most Out of HanziBook

  1. Start with the Browse panel and HSK1 filter — If you're new to Chinese, open Browse and filter to HSK1 — this is the standard beginner vocabulary set and the order most courses follow.
  2. Watch Animate before you try Practice — Watching the correct stroke order once or twice before tracing it yourself makes Practice mode far more effective — you're reinforcing a pattern, not guessing.
  3. Print one focused sheet per session — A short Model · Trace sheet for 8–10 new characters, written out a few times each, is more effective than a huge sheet you never finish.
  4. Pair the app with our written guides — Our beginner guides — radicals, HSK1/HSK2 vocabulary, grammar basics, and more — give you the "why" behind what you're practicing in the app.