HSK 1 – Vocabulary list and content

By Felipe / Last updated September 10, 2024

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HSK level 1 is the first of 6 levels in the official Chinese proficiency test HSK. It is the lowest of the HSK levels but that doesn't mean it's easy. When you are just getting started learning Chinese, everything is going to be very new to you. The language contains sounds that you have never heard before, the characters are very complicated, and to top things off, you have to get used to tones in Chinese. Let's have a look at the content of HSK 1 and the things you can say after passing it!

Quick disclaimer: This guide is about HSK version 2.0. An update to the HSK test (version 3.0) has been officially announced in 2021 and brings some significant changes. However, textbooks are still being updated to fit the new curriculum and you can not take the new HSK tests, yet. So for the foreseeable future, the current HSK 2.0 is going to stay relevant.

How many words are in HSK 1?

HSK level 1 contains 150 words consisting of 174 distinct characters. That means that at least some words contain more than one character.

Things you can do with HSK 1

You can already express a lot of things with the words included in the vocabulary list. Let's look at some examples of what you can say after passing the HSK 1 test.

Introduce yourself: You can introduce yourself, "My name is ... " (wǒ jiào ...), and ask others for their name, "What's your name?" (nǐ jiào shénme míngzi?).

Talk about things you like: You can express that you like or dislike something, using "xǐhuan" (喜欢 / 喜歡). Combining this with other words from the list, you could say things like, "I like my mother" (wǒ xǐhuan wǒ de māma), or, “I don't like you" (wǒ bù xǐhuan nǐ).

Talk about food: You can say things like, "I want to eat rice" (wǒ xiǎng chī mǐfàn) or "I want to drink water" (wǒ xiǎng hē shuǐ).

Ask questions: You can ask simple questions using the question particle "ma" (吗 / 嗎). For example, "Do you want to eat rice?" (nǐ xiǎng chī mǐfàn ma?) or "Do you like me?" (nǐ xǐhuan wǒ ma?).

Use measure words: Chinese requires the use of measure words when talking about the quantity of objects. For example, it is not possible to say "three books" as "sān shū" (三书 / 三書). Instead, the measure word for books needs to be added, "sān běn shū" (三本书 / 三本書). HSK 1 introduces the most common measure word, "ge" (个 / 個).

Talk about locations: You can ask for the location of things or persons. For example, "Where are you?" (nǐ zài nǎr?), or, "Where is the hotel?" (fàndiàn zài nǎr?).

Talk about times: You can ask about specific dates, for example, "When do you go to Beijing?" (nǐ shénme shíhou qù Běijīng?). You can also answer such questions, for example with, "I go to Beijing on the 4th of June" (wǒ liù yuè sì hào qù Běijīng).

Ask for the price: You can ask for the price of things, for example, "What's the price of this book?" (zhè běn shū duōshao qián?).

Things you cannot do with HSK 1

Although the word list for HSK 1 is rather short, it covers a large range of very common sentence structures. This is a great base to build upon, but there are two things preventing HSK 1 itself from being useful.

First, the vocabulary is too limited. Menus in Chinese restaurants usually don't just say "rice", "apple", and "water". Furthermore, you might be able to ask where the hotel is, but you don't know how to give any directions yet, so you won't understand the answer. Lastly, any conversation only consisting of HSK 1 words would be somewhere between pointless and extremely boring.

Your daily diet if you had to rely on HSK 1 vocabulary alone would only consist of water, apples, and rice — Your daily diet if you had to rely on HSK 1 vocabulary alone

The second problem is that natives neither know nor care about the HSK. This is of course natural but it's something that I always found extremely frustrating. No matter how carefully you craft your question, there are usually a dozen possible answers of which not a single one was in your textbooks. But hey, that's life.

Closing thoughts

Is HSK 1 enough to get anything done in real life? No. Does it teach important basics? 100%! The introduced grammar is absolutely essential to the Chinese language. Furthermore, just wrapping your mind around the concepts of tones, measure words, and question particles is going to be a lot to chew on.

All in all, I think HSK 1 does a good job of introducing new learners to the world of Chinese. However, passing the test itself is not all that useful, so you might as well save the money.

Until next time, happy learning! 🤓