How to Write 汁 (zhī) — Meaning “Juice; sauce; fluid”

Imagine you need to squeeze ten (十) oranges to get one glass of water (氵) — that water is fruit juice (汁). This simple image connects the two parts with the meaning of juice.

Write the left radical 氵 first: dot, dot, lift — keep it narrow. Then write 十: a horizontal stroke from left to right, followed by a vertical stroke crossing it. A common mistake is making the 十 too wide, which makes the character unbalanced.

汁 means "juice" or "sauce" and is very common in modern Chinese, especially in food words. In contrast, 㳄 is an ancient character for saliva and is almost never used today, while 氿 is a rare place name (a spring in ancient texts).

汁 is used to mean "juice" or "sauce" in everyday words like 果汁 (fruit juice) and 汤汁 (broth or gravy). You will see it on menus, juice bottles, and cooking instructions — it is a standard term for any thin liquid from food.

Common words containing 汁 include: 果汁 (guǒ zhī) — fruit juice; 橙汁 (chéng zhī) — orange juice; 汤汁 (tāng zhī) — Broth / Gravy.