想
xiǎng
In real, traceable use. Part of the curated seed collection; community review is coming.
To want to, would like to (do something); also to think, and to miss someone. Before a verb it is a mild wish: 我想喝茶 'I'd like some tea'; the negative is 不想. On its own it is thinking: 我想想 'let me think'. With a person as object it means missing them: 我想你 'I miss you'.
Muốn (làm một việc gì); cũng có nghĩa là nghĩ, và nhớ (một người). Đứng trước động từ là lời bày tỏ mong muốn nhẹ nhàng: 我想喝茶 (tôi muốn uống trà), phủ định là 不想. Đứng một mình là “nghĩ”: 我想想 (để tôi nghĩ đã). Tân ngữ là người thì thành “nhớ”: 我想你 (anh nhớ em).
VerbRegister: neutral
Examples
Editorial example (illustrative, not a corpus attestation) — awaiting a native-speaker check
Sources & notes
Hán-Việt bridge batch 063 (2026-11-14). Headword, Traditional form and pinyin checked against CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0) source ↗ · Hán-Việt reading: Unihan kVietnamese source ↗ · No Vietnamese entry is linked as its twin; the Hán-Việt reading is given character by character. Definition, literal gloss and example sentence are original; the example has not had a native-speaker check yet.
Common questions
What does “想” mean?
To want to, would like to (do something); also to think, and to miss someone. Before a verb it is a mild wish: 我想喝茶 'I'd like some tea'; the negative is 不想. On its own it is thinking: 我想想 'let me think'. With a person as object it means missing them: 我想你 'I miss you'.
Is “想” formal or informal?
想 is generally neutral.