How to add pinyin to Chinese web pages
Install the Chinese to Pinyin extension, open a Chinese page and press "Annotate page" in the toolbar popup. Pinyin appears above the characters, and hovering a word shows an English meaning. You can also annotate only selected text.
Try it on your own text
Paste Chinese into the converter, or add the extension to see pinyin above characters on any page.
Show pinyin on a page in four steps
- Install the extension from your browser's store with the buttons on this page.
- Open a web page with Chinese text.
- Click the extension icon in the toolbar and press Annotate page.
- Read: pinyin is shown above the characters. Hover a word to see its English meaning.
The page is annotated with standard HTML ruby text, so the layout stays readable and you can still select and copy the text.
Other ways to use the extension
| Need | What to do |
|---|---|
| Pinyin for one passage | Select the Chinese text. A small 拼 button appears next to it; click it to open the popup with that text |
| Pinyin for the selected text from the menu | Right-click, then choose Show Chinese to Pinyin |
| Every Chinese page, automatically | Turn on Auto-annotate pages in the popup |
| Video subtitles | Turn on Auto-annotate video subtitles |
| Pinyin style | Choose tone marks, tone numbers or no tones in Settings |
Video subtitles
The extension looks for the caption containers of several players, including YouTube, Bilibili, Netflix and generic Video.js players, and annotates the Chinese lines as they appear. It works when the site shows subtitles as text on the page; subtitles burned into the video picture cannot be read.
Pinyin from the popup too
The popup is a small converter: paste Chinese text and you get pinyin, an English layer when your browser supports translation, copy buttons and a save button for vocabulary. You can also type pinyin and get characters with the Pinyin → 汉字 button.
Try it on your own text
Paste Chinese into the converter, or add the extension to see pinyin above characters on any page.
Good to know
- The extension works on pages you open in your browser; it does not change the website itself.
- Annotation is automatic, so rare words and names can occasionally get an unexpected reading.
- If you run another extension that also adds pinyin to pages, turn one of them off to avoid duplicate marks.
Frequently asked questions
Does the extension work on every website?
It works on ordinary web pages with Chinese text. Pages that block extensions or draw text inside images are not supported.
Can I turn pinyin off?
Yes. Turn off Auto-annotate pages in the popup; reloading a page removes annotations that were already added.
Does it show English?
Hovering a word shows a short English meaning, and the popup has an English layer for sentences where your browser supports translation.
Is the extension free?
Yes.
Try it on your own text
Paste Chinese into the converter, or add the extension to see pinyin above characters on any page.