Chinese word

都

Pronunciation

Pinyindōu

Meaning

  • adverball

Example

我们都去了。wǒ men dōu qù le

We all went.

Illustration for 都 (all)

More examples

你们都吃了吗？nǐ men dōu chī le ma

Did you all eat?

Core concept

Every part of a group is included under one shared action, state, or result.

Common phrases

  • 我们都wǒ men dōu

    we all

  • 你们都nǐ men dōu

    you all

  • 他们都tā men dōu

    they all

Similar words

一起yì qǐ: Shows that people or things do the same action together at the same time.

Definition in Chinese

作为副词，表示属于同一集体的各个成员都发生相同结果或动作，通常置于主语之后。zuò wéi fù cí biǎo shì shǔ yú tóng yì jí tǐ de gè gè chéng yuán dōu fā shēng xiāng tóng jié guǒ huò dòng zuò tōng cháng zhì yú zhú yǔ zhī hòu

Word origin

The adverbial use of 都 (dōu, "all") developed from treating a group as a complete whole, so its scope spreads across each member.

Usage tips

  • Word order matters with negation: when this adverb comes before the negative marker, the usual meaning is that the whole group has the negative result, not merely that the group is incomplete.

Other meanings

  • everythingpronoun
  • entirelyadverb

Word lists with this word