Example sentences
tā他tiān天tiān天kàn看bào报zhǐ纸。
He reads the newspaper every day.
bào报zhǐ纸shàng上shuō说shén什me么？
What does the newspaper say?
About this word
News on paper, named by its parts. 报 is a report or bulletin, the 报 of 电报 (telegram) and 日报 (daily paper), and 纸 is paper. The compound is a plain countable noun: 一份报纸, 看报纸. 报 still stands alone for a paper in some fixed phrases, and as a verb it means to report, so 报告 is the fuller verb or the written report itself. Keep it apart from 新闻, which is the news as content rather than the object you hold.
The story behind the character
报
The traditional 報 is a picture of sentencing. On the left is 㚔, the handcuffs element. On the right, a hand presses down on a kneeling person. Xu Shen wrote 報, 當罪人也: to sentence someone to fit the crime. From giving a criminal what he is owed come "to repay" and "to report." The simplified 报 keeps a hand and the kneeling figure.
纸
纸 is 糸 (silk thread) plus 氏, which gives the sound. The silk radical is there for a reason: the first paper was made from leftover silk fibers, matted and pressed flat. Xu Shen wrote 紙, 絮一苫也, a sheet of silk waste. The Han court later credited Cai Lun with making paper from bark, rags and old fishing nets, and the character kept its silk thread anyway.