关于本站 · About
About this reference
Qīnyuán is an independent reference for English speakers learning how Chinese families are named. It covers 73 common kinship terms, the rules behind them, and the regional variants you will meet in real families.
What this site is
The site has two layers. The Chinese family tree is the map: five generations, three lanes and 73 terms you can click. The nine guides go deeper on the relative you actually need — grandmother, uncle, cousin, in-laws and the rest.
It is a learner's reference, not a dictionary. The aim is to explain why the words differ — which side, which generation, older or younger — rather than to list every term in the language.
How the terms were chosen
- Terms follow standard modern Mandarin (Putonghua) as used in mainland China.
- Everyday spoken forms come first; formal or written variants are noted where they are useful, such as 祖父 for 爷爷 or 外祖母 for 外婆.
- Regional variants are marked where they matter in daily life: 姥姥/姥爷 in the north, 阿嬷/阿婆 in Min- and Yue-speaking regions.
- 73 terms is a practical set for everyday family life, not a complete inventory of historical, classical or dialect terms.
Pinyin, tones and audio
Pinyin is written syllable by syllable with tone marks, including the neutral tone (奶奶 is nǎi nai, not nǎi nǎi). The colour of each syllable on the page shows its tone.
The audio buttons use your browser's speech synthesis (Web Speech API), not recorded native speech. The voice and its availability depend on your device and browser. Treat it as a pronunciation prompt and confirm difficult sounds with a native speaker.
What is not covered
- Historical kinship systems — concubinage, ranked siblings or multi-generation households — beyond the parts that explain a modern word.
- Dialect-specific vocabulary beyond the regional variants noted on the pages.
- Genealogy records (家谱), generation characters (辈分字) and family naming conventions in detail.
- Legal, immigration or family-law advice.
Corrections and updates
Pages are reviewed periodically; when a correction is confirmed, the page text and its “updated” date change together. The date at the top of each page is the last review date, not the date the term entered the language.
Usage varies by region and by family. If a word in your family differs from the standard form here, that is normal — the pages are a starting point, not a rule for every household. For a specific family, ask which term they use.
Editorial note
Independence
The site carries no advertising, sponsored placements or affiliate links at launch. The diagrams are built in HTML and SVG; there is no stock photography. No analytics scripts are installed. The reference is maintained as an independent project rather than as marketing for a language course.
Start with the whole family on one page.
Open the Chinese family tree