Radical and stroke criteria can be used independently or combined.
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How the Kanji Explorer works
What is in the dictionary?
The 13,108 character entries come from KANJIDIC2, with Japanese readings, meanings and dictionary information. Unihan supplements radical and stroke information used for browsing. These sources are combined in the same entries: Unihan does not add a second set of kanji to the 13,108 total.
How to find a kanji
Usually, start with a radical: choose its shape, optionally narrow the results by additional or total strokes, then select the kanji from the character cards. You can also search by Japanese reading, English meaning, kanji or Unicode code point. Show all opens the complete character list.
Draw and recognize
If you do not know the radical, open the drawing tool and trace the character on the pad, one stroke at a time. Select Search to send the drawing to the Python recognition service. The geometric recognition engine developed for this application compares stroke shapes and positions with KanjiVG reference data, supplemented by manually retraced examples of selected simple characters. It does not require the correct stroke order or direction. It ranks the candidates: inspect the first five, select Show next 5 for the next five, and click the matching kanji to open its dictionary entry. Undo last stroke removes the latest stroke and Clear starts again. The status above the search box indicates whether the page can reach the service.
Sources & Licenses
KANJIDIC2 — EDRDG
Japanese readings, meanings and dictionary information are derived from KANJIDIC2, copyright James William Breen and EDRDG.