宵 means “evening, early night”

よい · yoi

Also: wee hours

Kun'yomi (Japanese reading)

よい

On'yomi (Chinese reading)

ショウ

JLPT N1 · Taught in secondary school · 10 strokes

The story

Under a roof (宀), a small (⺌) moon (月): the first thin moonlight of evening, seen from the eaves. 宵 is early night: 今宵 is tonight in songs and poems, a 宵っ張り is a night owl, and 宵山 are the festive evenings before Kyoto's Gion parade.

Used in 今宵 (koyoi, tonight), 宵っ張り (yoippari, night owl), and 宵山 (yoiyama, festival eve)

More from Light & Shadow

• 旦 dawn
• 昭 bright
• 宙 midair
• 透 transparent
• 輝 shine
• 雰 atmosphere
• 暖 warm
• 陰 shade
• 暁 daybreak
• 闇 darkness

Learn 宵 and more kanji free on Fuji Learning · All kanji

Readings from KANJIDIC2, © EDRDG, CC BY-SA.