字 Kanji Decipher

Meaning & readings

longing, covetousness, greed, passion, desire, craving

On’yomi ヨク
Kun’yomi ほっ.する、ほ.しい

Origin

This character combines two parts to express desire. The right side, 欠, shows a person with mouth open, which is the visual foundation for meanings related to lacking or wanting. The left side, 谷, serves as a sound hint to tell you how to pronounce the character, rather than adding to its meaning. Together, the open mouth of someone lacking something captures the sense of longing or craving for what one does not yet have.

AI-generated (claude-haiku-4-5), not yet reviewed. Formation type (automated guess): Phono-semantic (meaning + sound hint).

欲 11 strokes

Components

  • 谷 sound hint left
  • 欠 radical right

A sound hint component points at the character’s pronunciation, not its meaning — don’t read a meaning into it.

Common words

  • 食欲 しょくよく appetite (for food)
  • 性欲 せいよく sexual desire; sex drive
  • 無欲 むよく unselfish; disinterested
  • 欲求 よっきゅう desire; want
  • 欲望 よくぼう desire; appetite
  • 意欲 いよく will; desire
  • 貪欲 どんよく greedy; avaricious
  • 欲しい ほしい wanting (to have); desiring

Related kanji

Same sound component 谷
Same radical

Reference

Strokes
11
Kangxi radical
76
Grade
Grade 6 (Kyōiku)
Frequency rank
#902 (newspapers)
Former JLPT
level 2
Unicode
U+06B32