Chinese Character Counter – Han Characters and Words

Q: Is this a Chinese word counter too?

Yes, in both senses. For a length set in 字, read Hanzi (汉字) or Characters (字符). For the words a dictionary finds in the text, read Words, estimated (词): the line under the counts says why that one is an estimate.

Q: Does the Chinese character counter count without punctuation?

Yes. Hanzi (汉字) leaves out every mark, ，。、？！ and both halves of “” and 《》 among them. To count with punctuation, read Characters (字符). 你好，世界！ is 4 without and 6 with.

What the 9 counts mean

Length, the numbers a limit is set in 4

Characters (字符) Everything in the box, one each: Chinese characters, marks, digits, Latin letters, spaces and line breaks. A full-width mark such as ， or 。 is one character, and so is each half of “” and 《》. The ellipsis ……, six dots that take the room of two characters, counts as two.
Hanzi (汉字) Every Han character, simplified or traditional: 汉字 and 漢字 are two each. A number written in characters counts, the round zero included (二〇二六年 is 5), and a number written in digits does not.
Without spaces (不计空格) The character count with spaces, tabs and line breaks taken out, the full-width space (U+3000 ideographic space) included. Chinese puts no spaces between words, so the two numbers part only at line breaks and where a space was typed: 你好世界 is 5 with its space and 4 without. The sample has none and reads 46 both ways.
Words, estimated (词) The pieces the browser’s dictionary cuts the text into, counted when they hold a character, a letter or a digit. A stretch in Latin letters and digits, such as Plan B 2026, is split at its spaces and is exact.

Show all 9 counts (5 more)

What the text is made of 2

Digits (数字) The digits 0 to 9, full-width ones such as １２３ included. A number written in characters is not a digit: 三 counts as a Chinese character and 3 as a digit, so 3天 is one of each and 三天 is two characters and no digit.
Punctuation (标点) Every character Unicode classes as punctuation: ，。；：？！, the enumeration comma 、, both halves of “” and 《》, the two halves of the ellipsis ……, and the middle dot · between the parts of a foreign name. The sample holds 6: ！ “ ” ， and two 。.

Structure 2

Paragraphs (自然段) A paragraph here is a line with text on it. A blank line is not one, and neither is a line that holds only a full-width space: 你好, an empty line and 再见 make 2 paragraphs. The sample is 1.
Sentences (句子) A sentence ends at 。, ？ or ！ and at a line break. A comma ， or an enumeration comma 、 ends none, and neither does an ellipsis in mid-sentence: 等一下……好了。 is 1. Speech written 他说：“好。”我走了。 counts 2, because the 。 inside the quotation marks ends one. A doubled ！！ ends one sentence, not two.

How the text is stored 1

Bytes in UTF-8 (字节) What the text weighs when it is stored as UTF-8. A Chinese character or a full-width mark takes three bytes where a, 1 and an ordinary space take one, so 汉字 is 2 characters and 6 bytes and the sample is 46 characters and 136 bytes. A rare character beyond the basic plane, such as 𠮷, takes four.

How this list was compiled: Own work. The 9 counts are the ones this page shows, picked for how Chinese length is set (in characters, 字数) and for what a text of Chinese characters, full-width marks, digits and Latin words does to a counter. Every example in a note was run through the counter this page uses, with the language set to Chinese, on 2026-10-06, and a note went in only when the result matched. No Chinese word count is quoted, because that number comes from the dictionary of the browser doing the counting. Chinese written without spaces between words, and words of one character or several: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_divider. The full-width marks, the six-dot ellipsis that takes the room of two characters, the enumeration comma, the title marks, the quotation marks and the middle dot in foreign names: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_punctuation. Numbers written in characters with 〇 for zero: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_numerals. Three bytes for most Chinese characters and four beyond the basic plane: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UTF-8. That Chinese word boundaries come from a dictionary: https://unicode-org.github.io/icu/userguide/boundaryanalysis/. The terms 汉字 (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/漢字), 字符 (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/字符), 不计 (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/不計) and 空格 (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/空格), 标点 (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/標點), 数字 (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/數字), 词 (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/詞), 句子 (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/句子), 自然段 (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/自然段), 字节 (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/字節) and 字数 (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/字數). Wikipedia and Wiktionary text is CC BY-SA 4.0. All read 2026-10-06. Licence: own work

How it works

This Chinese character counter leads with Hanzi (汉字), the Chinese characters alone. Punctuation, digits and Latin letters are counted beside them, not with them, and the total of all of them stands second.

Read the full guide

The sample, counted

The sample is 46 characters: 39 Chinese characters, 6 punctuation marks and the digit 3. A limit worded in 字, such as 800字, may or may not count the punctuation, so the page shows both numbers: ask whoever set it.

Chinese word count: characters, not words

A Chinese word count (字数) is a count of characters: the same term means both. A word may be one character or several, and no space marks where it ends, so the characters are what can be counted exactly.

Counting Japanese or Korean? Each has its own page under word counters.

Questions and answers

Is this a Chinese word counter too?

Yes, in both senses. For a length set in 字, read Hanzi (汉字) or Characters (字符). For the words a dictionary finds in the text, read Words, estimated (词): the line under the counts says why that one is an estimate.

Does the Chinese character counter count without punctuation?

Yes. Hanzi (汉字) leaves out every mark, ，。、？！ and both halves of “” and 《》 among them. To count with punctuation, read Characters (字符). 你好，世界！ is 4 without and 6 with.

How do I count Chinese characters in text mixed with English?

Paste it as it is. Latin letters, digits and spaces never count as Chinese characters: 请发 email 给我。 has 4 Chinese characters and 12 characters in all, or 10 without its two spaces.