引擎

yǐnqíng
noun HSK 7 #3,187

Measure Word

Meanings

  1. 1 engine; motor
  2. 2 search engine (in computing)

Characters

Literally 'lead and lift' — the thing that drives movement. This is actually a phonetic transliteration of 'engine' that also conveys the meaning nicely.

Examples

Zhè liàng chē de yǐnqíng fēicháng qiángjìng.
This car's engine is very powerful.
Sōusuǒ yǐnqíng gǎibiàn le rénmen huòqǔ xìnxī de fāngshì.
Search engines changed the way people access information.

Tips

usage
In everyday Chinese, 发动机 (fādòngjī) is more common for car engines, while 引擎 is preferred in tech contexts (搜索引擎, search engine) and when talking about engines figuratively (经济增长引擎, engine of economic growth).

Stroke Order

yǐn
qíng