Abacus was invented on the basis of Counting Rod that Chinese had used for a long period. In ancient times, people used small rods to count numbers. The small rod was called "Counting Rod" and calculation using counting rods was called "Rod Counting". Later, with the development of productivity, the number requiring calculation was larger and larger, and the limitation of calculation with rods was more and more apparent. Thereby, some people invented a kind of more advanced counter: abacus.

Abacus is rectangular with wooden frame on the four sides and small rods fixed inside, each one representing one digit. The rods are strung with wooden beads, and a girder across the middles separates abacus into two parts: the upper part, in which each rod has two beads, each representing the number "five"; and the lower part, in which each rod has five beads, each representing the number "one".

With the use of abacus, people had summarized many abacus rules. With proficient digital skills, the rules had made the calculating speed increase greatly. By the time of Ming Dynasty (1368 - 1644), people could use abacus to deal with addition, subtraction, multiplication and division, thus abacus calculation was widely used in calculating weight, amount, space and volume of an object.

Since abacus is inexpensive, simple to make, and easy to used, so that abacus became a convenient calculation tool widely used in China. Afterwards, abacus was gradually introduced to Japan and Korea as well as circumjacent countries and regions.