Phono-semantic compound 形聲字 (形声字)
xíngshēngzì · from Chinese
What is a phono-semantic compound?
A phono-semantic compound is a Chinese character combining a meaning component and a sound component; it is by far the most common character type.
The meaning part (often the radical) tells you the semantic field, while the phonetic part hints at the pronunciation, at least as it was in Old Chinese. Sound changes over 2,000 years make the hint imperfect, but it still works often enough to be useful. Most characters in a modern dictionary are of this type.
Examples
媽 mā = 女 (woman) + 馬 mǎ (sound); 晴 qíng (clear sky) = 日 (sun) + 青 qīng (sound); 銅 tóng (copper) = 金 (metal) + 同 tóng (sound)
Kungfucius says: Every Chinese character comes with a pronunciation hint, last updated around the Han dynasty.