人 is a side view of a standing person — two legs spread, no head, no arms, just the essential stance. Two strokes. Identical across 繁體 / 新字体 / 简体. Along with 日, 月, 山, 木, 水, it is one of the absolute foundation pictographs every CJK learner meets in week one.

The positional variant is everywhere. When 人 sits on the left of a compound, it flattens into 亻 (the "person radical"), and you can predict that the meaning involves a person, role, or human action: 仁 (benevolence), 仏 (Buddha), 住 (to live), 体 (body), 休 (to rest — a person leaning on a tree), 信 (trust — a person's word), 何 (what), 作 (to make). Spotting 亻 on the left of an unknown character cuts the meaning space in half.

Mandarin: rén, rising 2nd tone. 人 (rén, person), 人民 (rénmín, the people), 中国人 (Zhōngguórén, Chinese person), 男人 (nánrén, man), 女人 (nǚrén, woman), 人口 (rénkǒu, population — literally "people-mouths").

Japanese: two on-readings split by register — ジン (jin) in 日本人 (Nihonjin, Japanese person) and 巨人 (kyojin, giant); ニン (nin) in 人間 (ningen, human being — note: 人間 means "between-humans" originally, then "human"), 三人 (sannin, three people). The kun-reading ひと (hito) is the everyday spoken word for "person", and the suffix 人 (counter for people).

Memory aid: two legs walking. The minimal possible person.