New HSK Levels: Details Revealed

Rumors about the new HSK system have been going around since last year. This week, the official HSK standards have been released, so we don’t have to speculate any more!

We've looked at the official data and turned it into an infographic, but if you prefer text, scroll down below 👇

New HSK 2021: Q&A

1. When will the new HSK

standards come into effect?

The new HSK standards will be effective on July 1, 2021.

2. How different is the new HSK

from the old HSK?

Very different in 3 ways.

First, there will be 9 New HSK levels instead of 6.

Secondly, each level will have a set number of 300 new characters in each level, and a varying number of 500 to 1140 new words in each level based on all possible combinations of these characters. This means that Levels 1, 2, 3, 4 will be harder than before, but Levels 5 and 6 will be a bit easier – so the whole learning process will be more gradual.

And thirdly, the word lists have been revised to exclude some outdated words (e.g. “fax”).

3. How many levels will be

there in the new HSK?

The new HSK system will have 9 levels.

The new system is called “Three Levels and Nine Bands” – with “Levels” referring to 3 language levels (Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced) and “Bands” referring to 9 HSK Levels.

4. How many words will

each new HSK level have?

There be 300 new characters in each new HSK level.

Since characters can make up many more new words when put together, the number of words in each new HSK level will vary.

It’s like the snowball effect: Level 1 is going to be a bit easier, since only 500 words can be made of 300 characters; but when you move on to Level 2, you will have all the combinations of the new 300 characters AND all the characters from the previous level.

5. Why there are so many

more words in the new

HSK levels 1, 2, 3, 4?

The old HSK system had a considerable disadvantage: it was very easy to pass HSK 1 and HSK2 (with only new 150 words in each level), but really difficult to get to HSK 5 and 6 (with 2500 and 5000 words respectively).

So the new system tries to solve this problem by adding more words to HSK Levels 1, 2, 3, 4 to spread out the new words across levels, and to make the learning progress more gradual.

6. What are the advanced

HSK levels 7, 8, 9 all about?

The old HSK only had 6 levels. In the new HSK system, they added new Levels 7, 8, and 9. These levels will be higher than the old HSK6, and targeting higher proficiency levels (think of them as of Chinese for academic purposes).

If you look at the levels table, you will notice that HSK Levels 7, 8, 9 share the total number of new characters (1200) and new words (5636). It means all Level 7-9 test-takers will take the same test, and based on the score they get, they will qualify either for Level 7, 8, or 9.

7. What do these changes

mean for That’s Mandarin &

NihaoCafe?

We’ve been excited about this news since the beginning. That’s Mandarin uses its own, in-house curriculum developed for NihaoCafe. It is roughly based on HSK levels, but features many more important and useful words from everyday life. So we are happy that HSK has finally caught up! For example, in our NihaoCafe Level 1, we have 547 new words. And according to the new system, there will be 500 words in the new HSK 1 — so our level will be covering just a bit more.

For That’s Mandarin curriculum development team, this means that in the upcoming months we will need to update the HSK tags for every word in the system, and make sure that we are not missing out on any of the new words.

To Be Continued

We hope this information was helpful. We will keep posting the news about HSK on our website - there's quite a lot to process.

If you have any questions, please feel free to ask them in the comments below👇