HSK 1 Study Plan: Learn 500 Words in 4 Weeks

Hanzi Grove · 2026-11-07

You can cover the 500 words of HSK 1 (2021 standard) in four weeks by learning about two 10-word groups a day, six days a week, in 15 to 20 minutes. Each group is learned in rounds of three words, tested with a quick check, and repeated one day and three days later. One day a week is a checkpoint day with no new words.

This guide gives you the full plan: the daily routine, the week-by-week schedule, tips for tones and pinyin, and the mistakes that slow most learners down. It is built around the HSK 1 word list on Hanzi Grove, which splits the 500 words into 50 groups of 10.

How many words are in HSK 1?

In the 2021 Chinese Proficiency Grading Standards, the first band (level 1) lists 500 words and 300 characters. That is the list this plan uses.

You may see other numbers. The older HSK 2.0 exam used a 150-word list for HSK 1. The new HSK exam syllabus published in 2025 lists 300 words for level 1. If you are booking an exam, check which syllabus your test uses. Our guide to HSK 3.0 vs HSK 2.0 explains the differences.

Learning the 500-word list is not wasted effort either way. These are the most basic, high-frequency words in Mandarin, and you will need them at every level.

Is four weeks realistic?

Four weeks is a fast but workable pace if you study every day. It means meeting about 20 new words a day on learning days. That is a lot for a complete beginner, so be honest with yourself:

• Four weeks: two groups a day, six days a week. Best if you already know pinyin.
• Seven weeks: one group a day, every day. Slower, but much easier to sustain.
• Your own pace: the method below works at any speed. The order and the review timing matter more than the deadline.

If you fall behind, do not skip the reviews to catch up. Drop a new group instead. Reviews are what make the words stick.

How does each study session work?

Every group on Hanzi Grove uses the same simple method. Open a group, such as HSK 1 group 1, and follow these steps.

1. Learn in rounds of three

Do not look at all ten words at once. Work in small rounds:

1. Round 1: words 1 to 3. Listen to each word, read the pinyin, and look at how each character breaks into parts.
2. Round 2: words 4 to 6.
3. Round 3: words 7 to 10. The tenth word joins the last round.

Three words is a small enough set to hold in mind while you link sound, meaning and shape. For each word, spend a few seconds on the character breakdown. For example, 你 is 亻 (person) + 尔, and 好 is 女 (woman) + 子 (child).

2. Do a quick check after each round

Before you move on, test yourself on the three words you just met. Cover the meaning and recall it from the character. Then cover the character and recall it from the meaning.

This is called retrieval practice. Pulling a word out of memory strengthens it far more than reading it again. If you miss one, look at it again and test once more before the next round.

3. Do a final check on the whole group

After all three rounds, run a quick check on all ten words in mixed order. Aim to get every word right once before you stop. Words you miss go to the front of your next review.

4. Repeat after 1 day and after 3 days

Spaced repeats move words into long-term memory. For every group:

• Repeat 1: the next day.
• Repeat 2: three days after you first learned it.

A repeat is short: one quick check on the ten words, with a second look at anything you miss. It usually takes two or three minutes per group.

What does a daily 15–20 minute routine look like?

Here is a typical learning day once the plan is running:

If 20 minutes in one sitting is too long, split it. Do the review and one new group in the morning, and the second group in the evening. Two short sessions often work better than one long one.

On days when you are short of time, keep the reviews and skip the new groups. Five minutes of review is always better than nothing.

What is the week-by-week plan?

The plan uses six learning days and one checkpoint day per week. With two groups per learning day, you cover 12 or 13 groups a week.

Week 1: groups 1–13

The first groups cover the words you need to start talking: greetings, names, simple questions, family, food and daily routine.

• Day 1: groups 1–2. Group 1 includes 你, 好, 我, 叫, 名字, 是, 人, 谁, 请 and 坐.
• Day 2: groups 3–4. Review groups 1–2.
• Day 3: groups 5–6. Review groups 3–4.
• Day 4: groups 7–8. Review groups 5–6, and groups 1–2 (their 3-day repeat).
• Day 5: groups 9–10. Review groups 7–8 and 3–4.
• Day 6: groups 11–13. Review groups 9–10 and 5–6.
• Day 7: checkpoint (see below).

Day 6 has three new groups to keep the pace. If that is too much, move group 13 to week 2.

Week 2: groups 14–26

Continue the same pattern, with one three-group day as in week 1: two new groups a day, the 1-day repeat of yesterday’s groups, and the 3-day repeat of the groups from three days ago. These groups bring in time words, places, transport and common verbs such as 打, 听 and 找.

Week 3: groups 27–38

By now the routine should feel automatic. You will meet many words built from characters you already know, such as 休息 (xiūxi, to rest), 知道 (zhīdào, to know) and 医生 (yīshēng, doctor). Notice how much faster these go. That is the payoff from learning characters by their parts.

Week 4: groups 39–50

The last groups finish the list. Many words are combinations, like 喜欢 (xǐhuan, to like), 汉语 (Hànyǔ, Chinese language) and 吃饭 (chī fàn, to eat a meal). Use the final days of week 4 to finish any groups you moved and to catch up on reviews.

What happens on a checkpoint day?

The seventh day of each week has no new words. Instead you check how well the week has stuck:

1. Mixed quick check: test yourself on every group from the week in random order.
2. Mark weak words: note any word you missed or hesitated on.
3. Relearn weak words: go back to their groups and do one round of three with them.
4. Read aloud: read the example sentences on the group pages out loud, focusing on tones.
5. Check the plan: if you missed more than a quarter of the words, slow down next week.

A checkpoint takes 15 to 20 minutes, the same as a normal day. In week 4, the checkpoint becomes a full review of all 50 groups spread over the last two or three days.

How should you handle tones and pinyin?

Pinyin is the Latin spelling of Mandarin, and the tone marks are part of every word. Learning a word without its tone is like learning half a word.

Mandarin has four tones plus a neutral tone:

Some practical tips:

• Say every word aloud. Silent study does not train your ear or mouth.
• Learn the tone as part of the word. Say “hǎo”, not “hao, third tone”.
• Know the two key tone changes. Two third tones in a row become second + third: 你好 is said “ní hǎo”. And 不 (bù) becomes bú before a fourth tone, as in 不是 (bú shì).
• Watch neutral tones in common words. The second syllable of 名字 (míngzi), 妈妈 (māma) and 谢谢 (xièxie) is light and short.
• Mind the tricky spellings. In pinyin, “u” after j, q, x and y is really ü, as in qù (去). And “i” after z, c, s, zh, ch, sh and r is not an “ee” sound, as in shì (是).

If you are brand new to pinyin, spend two or three days on the sounds and tones before you start week 1. The start page is a good place to begin.

What are the most common HSK 1 study mistakes?

These are the habits that slow most learners down:

1. Reading lists instead of testing. Reading a word ten times feels productive but builds weak memory. Testing yourself builds strong memory.
2. Skipping the repeats. A word you do not see again within a few days is mostly forgotten. The 1-day and 3-day repeats are the most important part of the plan.
3. Ignoring tones. Tone errors are hard to fix later. Learn them correctly from the first day.
4. Treating characters as pictures. Breaking characters into components makes them far easier to remember. 休 is just 亻 + 木, and 明 is 日 + 月. See how Chinese characters are built.
5. Learning characters without words. Learn 名 inside 名字, and 明 inside 明天. Words give characters meaning and context.
6. Ignoring stroke order. You do not need perfect handwriting, but correct order helps memory and dictionary lookup. The stroke order rules take ten minutes to learn.
7. Studying in long, rare sessions. Two hours on Sunday is worse than 20 minutes every day.
8. Moving on too fast. If a checkpoint goes badly, slow down. Speed is useless if the words do not stay.

How do you know you are ready for the next level?

You are ready to move on when you can:

• recognise all 500 words on sight, with meaning and pinyin,
• read the example sentences on the group pages without help,
• hear a word and picture its characters, and
• pass a mixed quick check of any 50 random words with few or no mistakes.

At that point, keep a light weekly review of HSK 1 going while you start HSK 2.

Keep learning

Ready to begin? Open HSK 1 group 1 and do your first round of three today, or browse the full HSK 1 word list to see all 50 groups. If you want to understand the parts inside each character first, read Chinese radicals explained.