How to Say “Power outage” in Chinese
Emergencies and health · HSK 4
"Power outage" in Chinese is 停电了 (tíng diàn le). 停 means 'to stop' and 电 means 'electricity', so 停电 literally means 'electricity stopped'. The 了 at the end marks that it just happened; this is the Chinese way of saying 'the power went out'.
Primary translation
停电了
tíng diàn le
Traditional: 停電了
Variants by register
Formal
这里停电了，请问什么时候能恢复？
Zhèlǐ tíng diàn le, qǐngwèn shénme shíhou néng huīfù?
Casual
停电了！
Tíng diàn le!
When to use it
停 means 'to stop' and 电 means 'electricity', so 停电 literally means 'electricity stopped'. The 了 at the end marks that it just happened; this is the Chinese way of saying 'the power went out'. In big Mainland cities like Shanghai or Shenzhen outages are rare, but in older buildings or during summer peak usage (air-con overload) they still happen. If it's building-wide, call 物业 (wùyè, property management); if the whole block is dark, it's usually 国家电网 (State Grid) doing maintenance. Taiwanese often add 啦; 停電啦!
Example sentences
我们这栋楼停电了，电梯也不能用。
Wǒmen zhè dòng lóu tíng diàn le, diàntī yě bù néng yòng.
Our building has a power outage, and the elevator isn't working either.
停电了，手机快没电了，怎么办？
Tíng diàn le, shǒujī kuài méi diàn le, zěnme bàn?
The power's out and my phone is almost dead. What should I do?
请问什么时候来电？我需要工作。
Qǐngwèn shénme shíhou lái diàn? Wǒ xūyào gōngzuò.
Excuse me, when will the power come back? I need to work.