Example sentences
xiàn现zài在bā八diǎn点。
It's eight o'clock now.
wǒ我bā八suì岁。
I am eight years old.
The story behind the character
八
Two strokes, drifting apart. That's literally what 八 means: to separate. Xu Shen wrote 八, 别也: "eight, to part". Two strokes turned back to back, like a breakup. How it became the number 8 is just another case of the ancients borrowing a character and never returning it.
Related words
Related reading
Practise the numbers with audio →Every number from 1 to 100, each digit tap-to-hear, plus the tone changes that trip people up.