How are stroke counts determined?

Each character has a canonical number of strokes defined by its standard writing form, the same count used in dictionaries and stroke-order charts. This tool stores those counts in a built-in table covering common Simplified Chinese characters and adds them up for your passage.

Why is a character marked with a question mark?

A question mark means the character is not in the built-in stroke table. Rather than guess, the tool excludes it from the total and flags it so your count stays honest. The summary tells you exactly how many characters were skipped.

Are punctuation and Latin letters counted?

No. Only CJK ideographs are counted. Spaces, punctuation, digits and Latin letters are ignored entirely, so the total reflects the brushwork in the Chinese characters alone.

Does the same character always have the same stroke count?

Within a single standard, yes. However Simplified and Traditional forms of a character can differ in strokes, for example 国 has 8 strokes while the Traditional 國 has 11. This table uses the Simplified standard counts.

Is my text uploaded anywhere?

No. The stroke table is embedded in the page and all counting runs locally in your browser. Nothing you type is sent to a server, so the tool works offline once loaded and is safe for private text.

Chinese Stroke Counter

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The Chinese Stroke Counter adds up the brush strokes in a passage of Chinese text. Whether you are planning a calligraphy practice sheet, gauging how much handwriting a paragraph involves, or teaching stroke order, it gives a total, an average per character and a clear per-character breakdown.

How it works

The tool keeps a built-in table of canonical stroke counts for common Simplified Chinese characters — the same numbers you find in a dictionary or a stroke-order chart. It iterates over your text and, for every CJK ideograph, looks up its stroke count and adds it to a running total. Non-Chinese characters such as spaces, punctuation, digits and Latin letters are skipped so they do not distort the result. Characters that are not in the table are counted separately as unknown, marked with a ? in the breakdown and excluded from the sum, so the total never silently understates or overstates the real figure.

Example and notes

For a phrase like 永远微笑 the counter sums 5 + 7 + 13 + 10 = 35 strokes and reports an average of about 8.8 strokes per character. Keep in mind that stroke counts depend on the script: this table uses Simplified standard counts, and a Traditional form can differ — 国 is 8 strokes whereas the Traditional 國 is 11. The breakdown beneath the total shows each character with its stroke count as a subscript, making it easy to spot the most complex characters in a passage. Everything runs locally in your browser, so your text stays private and the tool works offline once the page has loaded.