--- title: Mandarin Chinese description: This introductory course covers the Pinyin phonetic system, basic Chinese characters, tones, and essential vocabulary of Mandarin. Learners will develop foundational speaking, listening, and reading skills for simple everyday communication. category: languages subcategory: asian-languages difficulty: beginner, intermediate, advanced url: /subject/mandarin-chinese-(beginner) --- # Mandarin Chinese This introductory course covers the Pinyin phonetic system, basic Chinese characters, tones, and essential vocabulary of Mandarin. Learners will develop foundational speaking, listening, and reading skills for simple everyday communication. ## Available Resources 5 Books • 8 Courses • 7 Websites ## Websites ### 1. Pleco Dictionary Mobile dictionary for Chinese with handwriting and audio input, stroke-order diagrams, example sentences, and an optional flashcard system. Learners look up unfamiliar characters encountered in reading and build review decks from saved entries. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.pleco.com/ **Tags:** chinese-dictionary, flashcards, vocabulary, characters, mobile-app ### 2. Chinese Zero to Hero Course platform organised around the HSK proficiency levels, pairing video lessons with graded vocabulary, grammar notes, and practice exercises. Students follow a structured path from HSK 1 upward and can gauge readiness for the official exam. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://chinesezerotohero.com/ **Tags:** hsk, mandarin, grammar, vocabulary, exam-prep ### 3. Hacking Chinese Olle Linge's long-running site collecting essays on Mandarin study method: tone acquisition, character memorisation, listening practice, and pacing. Readers come away with concrete techniques for structuring their own study rather than a curriculum to follow. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.hackingchinese.com/ **Tags:** study-methods, mandarin, tones, character-learning, listening ### 4. The Chairman's Bao Graded news articles in simplified and traditional Chinese, levelled by HSK band, with tap-to-define vocabulary, audio, and comprehension questions. Readers practise extensive reading on current events at a difficulty that matches their vocabulary. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.thechairmansbao.com/ **Tags:** graded-readers, reading-practice, hsk, news, vocabulary ### 5. Chinese Grammar Wiki AllSet Learning's reference cataloguing Mandarin grammar points by difficulty level, each with explanation, structure, and example sentences. Learners look up a construction they have met and see how it is formed and when it applies. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://resources.allsetlearning.com/chinese/grammar/ **Tags:** grammar, mandarin, reference, sentence-patterns, hsk ### 6. 魏晉風流 — Weijin Fengliu: Shishuo Xinyu Explorer A free Chinese-language reading and visualization website for Shishuo Xinyu, a collection of anecdotes about people in early medieval China. Readers can compare original passages, modern Chinese translations and Liu Xiaobiao's annotations, then explore historical figures through a relationship network, timeline and family views. Useful for readers with strong Chinese skills studying classical literature and Wei-Jin history. The original text comes from Wikisource; structured data and translations include AI-assisted work and may contain errors, so readers should check against the source text. Publicly accessible without registration. Suggested topics: classical Chinese literature and Chinese history. **Difficulty:** Advanced | **Language:** Mandarin | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.weijinfengliu.com/ ### 7. LingQ **Author:** Steve Kaufmann Reading and listening platform where learners import or choose texts with audio, look up unknown words inline and track vocabulary as it moves from new to known. It supports daily comprehensible-input practice and steady vocabulary growth across dozens of languages. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.lingq.com/ **Tags:** comprehensible-input, extensive-reading, vocabulary-acquisition, listening-practice ## Courses ### 1. Pimsleur Chinese (Mandarin) Level 1 Thirty half-hour audio lessons built on graduated-interval recall, prompting you to produce spoken Mandarin before hearing the correct answer. Focus is conversational speech and tones rather than characters, so you finish able to handle basic everyday exchanges. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.pimsleur.com/learn-chinese-mandarin **Tags:** mandarin, audio-course, listening, spoken-chinese, pimsleur ### 2. HSK 1 Complete Course A free YouTube playlist covering the full HSK 1 syllabus: roughly 150 core words, pinyin and tones, and the sentence patterns tested at that level. Lessons are structured like classroom units, with grammar explanations and worked examples. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL7VdqFXO0Lzdu2U1q-_vZxcuWyqJEitZV **Tags:** hsk, hsk-1, mandarin, vocabulary, grammar, video-lessons ### 3. HelloChinese A mobile app for absolute beginners that drills pinyin, tones, characters and short dialogues through gamified exercises, including speech recognition for pronunciation practice. Content is sequenced roughly along HSK levels, with a free tier covering the early units. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.hellochinese.cc/ **Tags:** mandarin, mobile-app, pinyin, characters, speaking-practice ### 4. Learn Chinese Duolingo's free Mandarin track for English speakers, built from short gamified drills on vocabulary, characters and simple sentences with audio prompts. Useful for daily habit-building and character recognition, though it gives limited grammar explanation and little extended speaking practice. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.duolingo.com/course/zh/en/Learn-Chinese **Tags:** mandarin, duolingo, vocabulary, pinyin, spaced-repetition ### 5. Yoyo Chinese Intermediate Video course picking up after basic conversational Mandarin, working through longer sentence patterns, connectives and everyday situational dialogue, with character reading tracks alongside. Lessons use side-by-side pinyin and characters and include drills for common intermediate grammar points. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://yoyochinese.com/ **Tags:** mandarin, video-lessons, grammar, listening, conversation ### 6. Chinese for Beginners Immerse yourself in the captivating world of Chinese culture and language with our ABC Chinese course for beginners. This comprehensive course provides an introduction to Mandarin phonetics and essential daily expressions, enabling learners to achieve a fundamental understanding and confidently engage in basic conversations. Our carefully crafted curriculum covers practical topics and real-life situations, ranging from exchanging personal information and discussing daily schedules to conversing about food, prices, city life, weather, and hobbies. The diverse selection of reading materials and interactive activities ensures a rich and stimulating learning experience, piquing learners' interests throughout the course. No need to worry about learning Chinese characters – this course focuses on speaking skills, making it accessible and enjoyable. Elevate your learning with a thrilling bonus feature: virtually travel to China and hone your speaking skills with our immersive game, playable on a VR headset or desktop. Embark on a scavenger hunt, talk to vendors, encounter fellow travelers, and explore a traditional market, all while applying your Chinese skills in a real-world environment. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** English | **Duration:** 6 hours of videos and quizzes | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.coursera.org/learn/learn-chinese **Tags:** courses, languages, asian-language ### 7. Intermediate Mandarin Chinese MandarinX certificate program for learners past the basics, emphasizing grammar and syntax while expanding recognized characters. Situational units cover commercial and cultural topics, so you can hold longer conversations and read short texts. Courses can be audited free. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.edx.org/certificates/professional-certificate/mandarinx-intermediate-mandarin-essentials **Tags:** courses, languages, asian-language ### 8. Learn Chinese: Basic Mandarin Vocabulary First course in MandarinX's beginner sequence, introducing pinyin, tones and a starter set of high-frequency characters through short business and travel scenarios. By the end you can introduce yourself, exchange basic information and read simple signs. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.edx.org/learn/mandarin-chinese/mandarinx-mandarin-chinese-level-1 **Tags:** courses, languages, asian-language ## Podcasts ### 1. ChinesePod **Author:** ChinesePod LLC Dialogue-based Mandarin lessons where hosts play a short native-speed conversation, then unpack its vocabulary, grammar and cultural context line by line. The beginner channel covers survival topics; paid tiers add transcripts, exercises and intermediate or advanced streams. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** en | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://www.chinesepod.com **Tags:** mandarin, spoken chinese, podcast, dialogues, vocabulary ### 2. Coffee Break Chinese **Author:** Coffee Break Languages Audio lessons from Radio Lingua in which a teacher walks a genuine beginner through Mandarin phrase by phrase, so you hear the mistakes and corrections. Episodes build pronunciation, tones and survival conversation at a deliberately slow pace. **Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** en | **Price:** Free **Link:** https://coffeebreaklanguages.com/chinese **Tags:** mandarin, spoken chinese, podcast, beginner chinese, conversation ## Books ### 1. Integrated Chinese, Level 2 Part 1 **Author:** Yuehua Liu, Tao-chung Yao Second-year college Mandarin textbook with longer dialogues, narrative texts, expanded grammar notes and exercises in both simplified and traditional characters. Learners move from sentence-level responses toward paragraph-length speech and reading on everyday and social topics. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/0887276725?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** books, languages, asian-language ### 2. Integrated Chinese, Level 1 Part 1 **Author:** Yuehua Liu, Tao-chung Yao First-semester college Mandarin textbook covering pronunciation and pinyin, basic sentence patterns, and core everyday vocabulary. Dialogues on greetings, family, dates and hobbies come with grammar notes, exercises, and both simplified and traditional character forms. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/0887276482?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** books, languages, asian-language ### 3. Intermediate Chinese: A Grammar and Workbook **Author:** Yip Po-Ching, Don Rimmington Routledge reference pairing concise explanations of Mandarin grammar with graded exercises and an answer key. Units cover aspect markers, comparison, complements of degree and direction, and complex sentence structures for learners past the first year. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/0415160391?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** books, languages, asian-language ### 4. Modern Mandarin Chinese Grammar **Author:** Claudia Ross, Jing-heng Sheng Ma Routledge reference organised in two parts: structural chapters on word classes, phrases and sentence types, followed by functional chapters on expressing time, comparison, requests and other communicative tasks. Serves as a lookup grammar rather than a course. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/0415700108?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** books, languages, asian-language ### 5. Practice Makes Perfect: Basic Chinese **Author:** Xiaozhou Wu McGraw-Hill workbook drilling foundational Mandarin: pinyin and tones, measure words, question forms, aspect markers and basic sentence order. Short explanations are followed by exercises with answers, aimed at reinforcing material met in a first-year course. **Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid **Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/0071784268?tag=edmonddante07-20 **Tags:** books, languages, asian-language --- *This content is part of Dantes.io - Your Treasure Map to Knowledge* *Curated by humans at Dantes.io. Personal study use welcome; republishing this curation requires permission (team@dantes.io).* View this page online: https://dantes.io/subject/mandarin-chinese-(beginner)