驾 (jià): to drive

Meanings

1 to drive
2 to harness
3 to pilot

Characters

驾

jià

to drive; harness

Examples

她有驾照，每天驾车上班。

Tā yǒu jiàzhào, měitiān jià chē shàngbān.

She holds a driver's license and drives to work every day.

学驾驶比我想的难多了。

Xué jiàshǐ bǐ wǒ xiǎng de nán duō le.

Learning to drive is much harder than I thought.

Tips

memory

加 (add) on top + 马 (horse) below — harnessing a horse to ride.

Components

radical

马 mǎ

horse

Bottom is the horse radical, simplified from a four-legged side-view of a horse with a flowing mane. It supplies the meaning: a horse harnessed to a vehicle — to drive, to pilot, hence 驾驶 (to drive). The radical anchors a large transport family: 驰, 骑, 驱, 驾.

phonetic

加 jiā

to add

Top 加 supplies the sound — jiā shifted to jià with a tone change but otherwise an exact match. 加 itself combines 力 (strength) and 口 (mouth) for 'add by speaking', and that imagery is incidental here; 加 is read for sound. Same phonetic family includes 架 (rack), 嫁 (marry off), 价 (price), 驾.