酷
酷 — Cruel
cruel, severe, atrocious, unjust
On’yomiコク (koku)
Kun’yomiひどい (hidoi)
Stroke order (14 strokes)
Watch the strokes draw themselves in the correct order — numbers mark where each stroke starts. Diagram from KanjiVG (CC BY-SA).
Common words using 酷
| Word | Reading | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 過酷 | かこく kakoku | severe; harsh; hard |
| 残酷 | ざんこく zankoku | cruel; brutal; ruthless |
| 酷似 | こくじ kokuji | resembling closely; being strikingly similar; bearing a strong likeness |
| 冷酷 | れいこく reikoku | cruelty; coldheartedness; relentless |
| 酷い | ひどい hidoi | cruel; heartless; hard |
| 酷 | こく koku | severe; harsh; stringent |
Study notes
酷 is a JLPT N1 kanji written with 14 strokes. It is taught at secondary-school level in Japan. Ranked #1596 of the 2,500 most frequent kanji in newspapers. On’yomi (音読み) are Chinese-derived readings mostly used in compound words; kun’yomi (訓読み) are native Japanese readings, with any highlighted part written in hiragana after the kanji (okurigana).
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