Simplified characters

Simplified Chinese
Type	Logographic
Languages	Chinese
Time period	Since early 20th century
Parent systems	Oracle Bone Script Seal Script Clerical Script Traditional Chinese Simplified Chinese
Sister systems	Kanji Chữ Nôm Hanja Khitan script Zhuyin
Direction	Varies
ISO 15924	Hans, 501

Simplified Chinese characters (; jiǎnhuàzì) are standardized Chinese characters prescribed in the Table of General Standard Chinese Characters for use in mainland China. Along with traditional Chinese characters, it is one of the two standard character sets of the contemporary Chinese written language. The government of the People's Republic of China in mainland China has promoted them for use in printing since the 1950s and 1960s in an attempt to increase literacy. They are officially used in the People's Republic of China and Singapore.

Traditional Chinese characters are currently used in Hong Kong, Macau, and the Republic of China (Taiwan). While traditional characters can still be read and understood by many mainland Chinese and the Chinese community in Malaysia and Singapore, these groups generally retain their use of Simplified characters. Overseas Chinese communities generally tend to use traditional characters.

Simplified Chinese characters may be referred to by their official name above or colloquially (;  jiǎntǐzì). Strictly, the latter refers to simplifications of character "structure" or "body", character forms that have existed for thousands of years alongside regular, more complicated forms. On the other hand, the official name refers to the modern systematically simplified character set, that (as stated by Mao Zedong in 1952) includes not only structural simplification but also substantial reduction in the total number of standardized Chinese characters.