When to add 色
- As a noun, use the full word: 我喜欢红色 (wǒ xǐhuan hóngsè, I like red).
- Before a noun, drop 色 in common pairs: 红酒 (hóngjiǔ, red wine), 白菜 (báicài, Chinese cabbage, "white vegetable"), 黑板 (hēibǎn, blackboard). Adding 的 also works: 红色的车 (a red car).
- To say something is a color, use 是…的 or the color with 的: 我的车是红色的 (my car is red). Do not add 是 to a bare color the way English uses "is".
To ask "what color?", say 什么颜色？ (shénme yánsè?).
Light and dark
浅 (qiǎn, shallow) makes a color lighter and 深 (shēn, deep) makes it darker: 浅蓝色 is light blue, 深绿色 is dark green. 粉红色 (pink) is literally "powder red".
青 (qīng) covers blue-green and sometimes black, depending on the word, so it is best learned inside words such as 青菜 (green vegetables) rather than as a color on its own.
What colors mean
- Red (红) is the color of luck and celebration: weddings, Chinese New Year decorations, and the red envelopes (红包, hóngbāo) of money given as gifts.
- White (白) is the traditional color of mourning and funerals, so white flowers or envelopes are avoided as gifts at happy occasions.
- Yellow (黄) was the emperor’s color, but in modern slang 黄色 also means pornographic: 黄色电影 is an adult film, not a yellow one.
- Green (绿): a green hat (绿帽子) means your partner is cheating, so never give one as a present.
- Stock prices in mainland China and Taiwan show rises in red and falls in green, the reverse of the US.
Example sentences
| Chinese | Pinyin | English |
|---|---|---|
| 你喜欢什么颜色？ | nǐ xǐhuan shénme yánsè? | What color do you like? |
| 我喜欢蓝色。 | wǒ xǐhuan lánsè. | I like blue. |
| 天是灰色的。 | tiān shì huīsè de. | The sky is gray. |
| 这件衣服有黑色的吗？ | zhè jiàn yīfu yǒu hēisè de ma? | Do you have this in black? |
Common mistakes
- 我的车是红. Say 我的车是红色的 or 我的车是红的.
- Calling everything brown 棕色. Many speakers say 咖啡色 (coffee color) for everyday browns.
- Tones on 蓝 and 绿. lán is second tone; lǜ uses ü, typed as lv on a pinyin keyboard (see how to type Chinese).