抢 (qiǎng): to snatch; to grab

Meanings

1 to snatch; to grab
2 to rob; to loot
3 to rush to do; to scramble for

Characters

抢

qiǎng

to grab; to snatch; to rush

Examples

有人抢了她的包！

Yǒurén qiǎng le tā de bāo!

Someone snatched her bag!

大家都在抢打折的商品。

Dàjiā dōu zài qiǎng dǎzhé de shāngpǐn.

Everyone is scrambling for the discounted goods.

双十一大家都在抢购。

Shuāng Shíyī dàjiā dōu zài qiǎnggòu.

On Singles' Day everyone is rushing to buy.

Tips

usage

抢 ranges from criminal (抢劫 = rob) to playful (抢红包 = scramble for red envelopes on WeChat). Context picks the register.

culture

抢红包 — grabbing digital red envelopes in WeChat group chats — became a national pastime during Chinese New Year. The competitive 'grab' element is what made it viral: envelopes drop in a chat and everyone races to tap fastest.

mistakes

抢 has a literary second reading qiāng (first tone) meaning 'to knock against' (as in 呼天抢地, crying out and beating one's head on the ground) or 'against' (as in 抢风, against the wind). Modern everyday use is almost entirely qiǎng — qiāng only appears in fixed classical phrases.

Components

radical

扌 shǒu

hand

Left hand radical — the side-stacking variant of 手. Anchors 抢 in fast hand-action verbs: snatching, robbing, scrambling. The image is a hand thrown out to seize something before someone else can. Family: 拿 (take), 掏 (pull out), 扯 (yank), 夺 (seize).

phonetic

仓 cāng

warehouse; storehouse

Right 仓 supplies the sound — cāng shifted to qiǎng, a regular palatalisation in this phonetic series. Same family: 创 (create), 沧 (dark blue), 苍 (deep grey-green), 舱 (ship's cabin). 仓 also gives a faint semantic flavour — grabbing food from a granary, raiding a stockpile.