📖 Meaning & Origin
The 火 radical represents fire and flames. As the bottom variant 灬 (four dots), it appears in kanji related to heat, cooking, and fire. At N5, 火 (Tuesday in Japanese — literally 'fire day') is the core kanji.
📚 Kanji by JLPT Level
✍️ Where it appears & how it changes shape
火 sits on the left in 焼 and 灯, and at the bottom it flattens into 灬, four short strokes called れっか. 点, 照, 熱 and 無 all end in this bottom form. The change is dramatic enough that many learners never connect 灬 with fire at all.
🔍 Don't confuse it with
Similar outline once handwritten quickly. 火 has two short side strokes; 大 has none.
Also appears at the bottom of kanji (思, 急). 灬 is four separate short strokes; 心 has a curved base stroke.
📈 Beyond N5 — what comes next
| Kanji | Reading | Meaning | Level |
|---|---|---|---|
| 点 | てん | point, dot, mark | N4 |
| 熱 | ねつ / あつい | heat, fever | N3 |
| 焼 | しょう / やく | to burn, to grill | N3 |
JLPT does not publish official kanji lists by level. These levels follow the commonly used reference lists and are a guide, not a guarantee.
🗣️ Words you will actually meet
Literally flower + fire.
🎯 How to use this radical in JLPT study
When you see four short strokes along the bottom of a kanji, fire or heat is the first guess to try: 熱 (heat), 焼 (grill), 照 (shine). It is a reliable guess but not a rule. 無 (nothing) ends the same way for unrelated historical reasons, so treat 灬 as strong evidence rather than proof.
⚠️ The mistake I see most often
Counting 灬 as one stroke because it looks like a line of dots. It is four, and stroke count matters when you look a kanji up by radical.
💡 Teacher's Memory Tip
Four strokes like flickering flames. The four dots at the bottom (灬) look like a gas burner — heat rising up from below.
❓ Frequently Asked Questions
The 火 radical means 'fire.' It represents both actual fire and concepts of heat, burning, and energy. 火曜日 (Tuesday) literally means 'fire-day.'
N5 kanji: 火 (fire/Tuesday). As you advance, you'll encounter 焼 (burn), 炎 (flame), 煙 (smoke) in N4/N3.
Imagine flames shooting up — the two strokes in 火 look like fire rising. Or think of the four bottom dots (灬) as a gas burner producing heat.
Other N5 Radicals
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