There are mainly two sub genres of the art form: Hehuang Hua'er and Taomin Hua'er.

Hehuang Hua'er, also known as "Shaonian" (youth), mainly prevails in Hezhou of Gansu (currently Gansu's Linxia Hui Autonomous Prefecture) and the region along Qinghai's Huangshui River. This genre is more widespread and more influential with more audio and video releases.

Hehuang Hua'er boasts rich tunes with elegant, simple and vivid lyrics as well as very compact structure, enabling the art form to brilliantly express emotions. Each part contains four or six sentences. The singing is also done in a free style, most of which are solo, with antiphonal singing and group singing. The melody of Hehuang Hua'er is sonorous, bold and unrestrained. There are more than a hundred tunes and more than 40 are very widespread.

Taomin Hua'er is a general term including Lotus Mountain Hua'er and Min County Hua'er. It is popular mainly among the Han people and prevails in Linxia Hui Autonomous Prefecture's Kangle and Hezheng counties, Dingxi Region's Lintao and Weiyuan counties, Wudu Region's Minxian, Wudu, Dangchang and Wenxian counties and Lintan, Zhuoni and Zhouqu counties of Gannan Tibet Autonomous Prefecture of Gansu Province.

Taomin Hua'er could be further categorized as Southern and Northern Hua'er mainly in terms of the differences in tunes, lyrics and performing styles. The Southern Hua'er is mainly centered on the Erlang Mountain Hua'er in Minxian County, and the Northern Hua'er is based on the Lianhua Mountain Hua'er in Kangle County.

Author: Jeff