价 (jià): price; value

Meanings

1 price; value
2 cost

Characters

价

jià

price; value

Examples

这个东西的价格是多少？

Zhège dōngxi de jiàgé shì duōshao?

How much does this cost?

房价太高了。

Fángjià tài gāo le.

Housing prices are too high.

打折的价钱很便宜。

Dǎzhé de jiàqian hěn piányi.

The discounted price is very cheap.

Tips

usage

价 appears in 价格 (price), 价钱 (price/cost), 价值 (value), 物价 (commodity prices), 评价 (to evaluate). It is usually combined with other characters rather than used alone.

register

Two minor readings exist: a literary jiè meaning 'messenger / servant', and a dialectal particle jie used between an adverb and a verb for emphasis, as in 震天价响 ('roaring fit to shake the sky'). Standard everyday use is jià.

Components

radical

亻 rén

person (radical form)

Left radical 亻, person. The traditional 價 was 亻 plus 賈 (merchant). The simplified form keeps the person radical and swaps in the simpler 介. Price is a human construct: what one person will give another for a thing.

phonetic

介 jiè

between; mediate

Right component 介 supplies the sound (jiè drifted to jià) plus a fitting echo: 介 means 'in between, to mediate', and a price is the mediator between buyer and seller, the agreed in-between value. The traditional 價 instead used the merchant 賈 as phonetic.