黑 — the “black” radical

Radical #203 12 strokes

The black radical. 3 of the JLPT kanji on this site are built with it — recognizing the piece makes them far easier to remember.

Kanji using the 黑 radical (3)

黒black 黙silence, become silent 黛blackened eyebrows

← 黍 millet 鼓 drum →

Radicals (部首, bushu) are the shared building blocks of kanji, used to sort them in every dictionary. Learn the common ones and new kanji stop looking random.