10 Best Chinese Online Dictionaries

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If you’ve read some of my articles, you already know I’m no fan of big, heavy, expensive printed dictionaries. I’m all for online and downloadable dictionaries that I can take with me on my trips because they’re handy anytime and anywhere.

I even wrote a blog post on the best online dictionaries where you can find, among others, some of my Chinese dictionary recommendations.

Here’s how online dictionaries can help with Chinese, and how to pick the one that suits you.

Before the list, it helps to know when bilingual and monolingual dictionaries each make sense.

A note from the Fluent in 3 Months team before we get started: You can chat away in Chinese for at least 15 minutes with the “Fluent in 3 Months” method. All it takes is 90 days. Tap this link to find out more.

Bilingual and Monolingual Dictionaries and Google Image Search

When looking for an online dictionary, be sure you know exactly what features or content you’re looking for.

A bilingual dictionary is often useful when you’re starting out. As you improve, a monolingual dictionary can help you spend more time thinking in Chinese and notice distinctions that a one-word English translation misses.

Take 慢走 (màn zǒu). Word by word it can look like “walk slowly”, but it also works as a polite expression when someone is leaving. A bilingual result without context can miss that use.

I’ve included both kinds below. Some are Chinese-English tools for quick lookup, while others are Chinese-only references for when you’re ready to work through definitions in the language itself.

I also use Google Image Search as a language-learning resource. Sometimes the meaning of a concrete word is easier to grasp from an image than from another translation.

For example, 山寨 (shānzhài) can refer to a mountain stronghold, and in modern usage it can also mean a knock-off or counterfeit product. An image search can help you see which sense fits the context, while giving you a memorable association for the word.

With that in mind, here are 10 Chinese dictionaries and dictionary apps worth trying.

1. Pleco

Pleco is an all-in-one Chinese dictionary app for iOS and Android. The free download includes its dictionary search engine, basic dictionaries, audio and a light document-reader function, without advertising.

Its strongest feature is the range of ways you can look something up: characters, pinyin, handwriting or your phone’s camera. Pleco also supports both simplified and traditional characters, and it has native-speaker recordings for thousands of Mandarin words.

Many of those extras are paid add-ons, including the full OCR, flashcard and document-reader tools, plus licensed dictionaries from publishers such as Oxford and Tuttle. Start with the free version, then add only the parts you’ll actually use.

I recorded this Pleco demo years ago, but it still shows why tap-to-look-up and OCR are useful:

2. NAVER English-Chinese Dictionary

The old LINE Dictionary now redirects to NAVER’s English-Chinese Dictionary. It’s a straightforward web option for bilingual lookup.

NAVER’s wider dictionary hub also links to word lists, its open dictionary and Papago translation. That makes it handy when a single entry doesn’t give you enough context.

3. Hanping Chinese Dictionary

Hanping retired its separate Lite app in January 2025. The main Hanping Chinese Dictionary is now free on iOS and Android, with some add-ons available as one-off in-app purchases.

You can look up Mandarin words offline using English, pinyin or Chinese characters. It includes handwriting and voice recognition, native-speaker audio, example sentences, character decomposition, HSK 2.0 and 3.0 word lists, and both simplified and traditional characters.

Hanping is especially useful if you want a clean offline dictionary and detailed character tools without needing a browser connection.

4. MDBG

MDBG is a free web-based Chinese-English and English-Chinese dictionary built on CC-CEDICT. You can search by Chinese, pinyin or English, with or without tone numbers.

It also includes text annotation, character and radical lookup, flashcards, quizzes and tools for typing Chinese or pinyin. The interface is plain, which makes it quick to use when you simply need an entry and a few examples.

5. Iciba

Iciba, or Kingsoft PowerWord, combines dictionary lookup with text, image, document and web-page translation. It runs in the browser and also offers desktop and mobile apps.

The site is mainly in Chinese, so it suits learners who are comfortable navigating a Chinese interface. For quick Chinese-English lookup it’s easy enough to use, while the extra translation tools are there when you need a whole passage rather than one word.

6. Youdao

Youdao is a Chinese dictionary and translation service from NetEase. Its current dictionary supports Chinese-English lookup alongside French, Korean and Japanese pairs with Chinese.

Like Iciba, the website is built mainly for Chinese speakers. That makes it less friendly for a complete beginner, but useful once you can work through a Chinese interface and want to compare Chinese explanations with English results.

7. Zdic (汉典)

Zdic is a large Chinese-only reference, so it’s a strong next step when you want to move beyond bilingual definitions. It includes more than 100,000 characters and 600,000 words.

You can search through character decomposition, components, radicals, pinyin or zhuyin, and switch between simplified and traditional Chinese. It’s especially useful for tracing how a character is built or checking a Chinese definition in detail.

8. Yellow Bridge

YellowBridge is a Chinese-English dictionary and thesaurus with more than 200,000 entries. You can search by Chinese, pinyin or English, or find a character through handwriting, radicals, stroke count and components.

Entries include pronunciation, example sentences, word and character decomposition, synonyms, antonyms, etymology and animated stroke order. You can choose simplified or traditional characters, which makes it useful for learners on either track.

Some advanced features require a subscription, but the core lookup and many character tools are available for free.

9. Ministry of Education Concise Mandarin Dictionary

Taiwan’s Ministry of Education publishes this Chinese-only learner’s dictionary. It uses traditional characters and zhuyin, making it especially useful if you’re learning the form of Mandarin used in Taiwan.

You can search normally or browse by zhuyin, stroke count and radical. The site also includes learner notes and appendices, and comes directly from the Ministry rather than a community-edited database.

10. Wiktionary

Wiktionary is a community-edited dictionary rather than an encyclopedia. A Chinese entry can include simplified and traditional forms, pinyin, pronunciation, definitions, usage notes and related words on one page.

It’s particularly handy for checking etymology or seeing how the same written form works across languages. Since anyone can edit it, treat it as a useful starting point and compare an important answer with one of the specialist dictionaries above.

Once you’ve picked a dictionary, use it to understand words in context rather than collecting isolated translations. And if you want a practical route into Mandarin, my Language Hacking Mandarin book is a good next step.