妙 means “exquisite, strange, subtle”

みょう · myou

Also: queer, mystery

Kun'yomi (Japanese reading)
たえ
On'yomi (Chinese reading)
ミョウ, ビョウ

JLPT N1 · Taught in secondary school · 7 strokes

The story

A woman (女) and a little (少): picture something small and delicate that is hard to put into words. 妙 is both exquisite and strange: 絶妙 is perfectly judged, 奇妙 weird, and 微妙, subtle, is how Japanese say something is just 'meh'.

Used in 微妙 (bimyou, subtle; iffy), 奇妙 (kimyou, strange), and 絶妙 (zetsumyou, exquisite)

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