By Master Wei Lin · Updated August 3, 2026
Chinese Metaphysics Scholar
What is the Chinese surname Liu?
Liu (刘 (traditional 劉)) is a Chinese surname counted at 15 Kangxi strokes and read as the Fire element. In the Five Grids its heaven grid (天格) is 16, The Noble Benefactor, and given names are scored over those strokes.
Liú
刘 (traditional 劉), 15 Kangxi strokes · Fire element (火)
Also romanized: Lau, Lew, Low
In the Five Grids (三才五格) the surname sets the heaven grid (天格): for 刘 it is 16, The Noble Benefactor (Very Auspicious). The heaven grid is shared by everyone who carries the surname, so the classical reading never judges it alone; it matters only as the top of the Three Talents (三才) sequence. What a naming reading actually weighs is the given name over these strokes.
Best-scoring names over 刘, by element
Live output from the ranker behind the Chinese Name Report: for each favourable element (用神) the chart could prescribe, the single best-scoring two-character given name over 刘, with its self grid (人格) read against the 81-number table. Your child's chart picks the row.
Frequently asked questions
What is the Chinese character for the surname Liu?
The surname Liu is written 刘 (traditional form 劉) and counted at 15 strokes on its traditional Kangxi form, the convention the naming stroke systems score on.
What element is the surname Liu?
In the naming tradition the surname 刘 is read as the Fire element. The surname's element is fixed and inherited; what a naming reading balances is the GIVEN name, whose characters are chosen to feed the element the birth chart most needs (用神), read from the full Four Pillars.
What does the heaven grid (天格) of Liu mean?
The heaven grid (天格 tiān gé) is computed from the surname's strokes, 16 for 刘, and it is shared by everyone who carries the surname, so the classical reading never judges it on its own. It matters only as the top of the Three Talents (三才) sequence, where its element interacts with the self grid below it. A so-called unlucky heaven grid says nothing about a person.
Which given names score best with the surname Liu?
The best given names over 刘 depend first on the child's or adult's own chart: the favourable element (用神) picks the character pool, and only then do the Five Grids rank candidates over the surname's strokes. The Chinese Name Report computes exactly that for a newborn, and the Chinese Name Analysis grades the name an adult already carries.
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