Pinyin

Pinyin, more formally called Hanyu Pinyin, is currently the most commonly used romanization system for Standard Mandarin. Hànyǔ (汉语 / 漢語) means the Chinese language, and Pīnyīn (拼音) means "phonetics", or more literally, "spelling sound" or "spelled sound".

Pinyin has superseded older romanization styles such as Wade-Giles, from 1859, and Chinese Postal Map Romanization.