LLearn Japanese

What do YOU do when you see unkown kanji?

  • August 11, 2025

Hey guys, I wanted to ask what your way of learning/memorizing an unknown kanji.
When I read a book and see a kanji I don't know, I try to look it up on Jisho using the radicals/guessed reading. This usually takes a lot of time and is not very comfortable outside of the house. Do some of you recommend investing in a kanji dictionary? What do you do?

EDIT: thanks for all the good comments, I should have mentioned I read physical books, I dont read much on PC. In that case do people here recommend getting a physical dictionary?

by Hito-1

47 comments

  1. I use the Shirabe Jisho iOS app to look it up since you can handwrite it. If I’m reading on the computer, then I use Yomitan or KanjiTomo so I can just hover over the word to look it up.

  2. I’m usually very lazy and if I can’t find it within a minute, I just move on. I’ll only put extra effort in if I can’t understand the sentence at all because of it, in which case I’ll draw it on jisho which is a pain in the arse because you need to do it in the right order usually or it won’t work.

  3. If I’m at home and have access to my tablet sometimes I’ll use that to write them out but if I’m out and about I just use shirabe jisho and got really good with radicals.

    An alternative option that I was going to try but never really did is using post it stickies and putting notes on unknown kanji to look at again back home using the above method

  5. Open a dictator and ask my gf the reading. Sometimes I just try to guess tye meaning from context if I just want to enjoy reading and not focused on studying.

  7. I take my tablet and draw the kanji using Google handwriting input, than I type the kanji into the dictionary, check its meaning, the words that use this kanji and kanji’s etymology. Then I select several words to add them into my anki deck, preferably at least a single word for each reading, unless it’s something really obscure.

  8. I do everything digitally, so there’s always some way to transcribe text. Either OCR or text hooking, or just read something from directly transcribable text in the first place. Combine that with a mouse-over dictionary and its quick and easy.

    Jisho’s kanji assembly minigame thing is the second best option, it was slow at first but I got way faster at it over time.

  9. I eirher draw the kanji on google translate then copy paste in Jisho, or use a text recognition app (PowerToys) that let me screenshot text with snooping tool and then its in my clipboard so I paste it in Jisho.

  10. If I can’t copy it and there’s no furigana, I just draw it with the windows IME Pad. That almost always works. In the rare occasions it doesn’t (mainly when the kanji is super tiny and I can’t properly replicate it), I just do a couple of the strokes and then look at the list of suggestions in the IME Pad.

    I think only once I had to look at a list of kanji sorted by radicals to find it. But that was really one time only.

    I’ve studied Japanese at uni, so I know how to write most kanji. There are rules to the order and it’s not super hard to learn.

    I got an IME Pad-thing on my phone too, but I mainly look up kanji at my desk. When I’m out and about and reading manga, I don’t really look up unknown kanji.

  11. Well for me when stumbling an unknown kanji, I’ll handwrite it on google translate. Google is pretty good recognizing handwritten kanji even in cursive which is impressive. It also gives you related vocabularies in kun and/or onyomi. It also helps a lot since it keeps history of it and you can copy paste it to Jisho if you need more details. As for investing in kanji dictionary, yes I have it in excel just as database but I would rather have flashcards as end product to excercise them in bare minimum coupled with kanji writing session whenever I feel like it. 😉

  12. I leave it blank for a moment and read the whole sentence. Based on the context, I make a guess. Lastly, I use the dictionary (or Wiktionary, which sometimes ends up sending me down the rabbit hole and making me forget what I’m reading) Rinse and repeat.

  14. Not happening often nowadays, but I always have written down any word I don’t know for sure.

  16. I usually write it on google translate OCR thing, which is much better at recognising kanji that jisho.org one. Before that I used to do it with radical search on jisho, but that takws too long.

    If I cannot really see the kanji and its parts at all I’ll try using google lens. If that also doesn’t work, I use the old method of searching with radical look up if I can at least recognise one part of a kanji. Usually when I need to go that far its because its some kyūjitai or alternate version of some kanji, so if kanji somewhat looks like a kanji I know, I look up if its kyüjitai or alternate of it.

    Otherwise, if I don’t have my phone nearby for handwritting search method (which is the fastest method) I write all the radicals/components of a kanji/similar kanji in Japanese on the search engine for example 口 虚 for 嘘 or 糸 識 for 織 and I find it. Then its just copy and paste for its meaning.

  18. If it’s in something I really need to read and there’s no furigana I will look it up using radicals, most of the time I will skip it though bc I’m lazy. If it’s a kanji I think I should know but can’t remember for some reason I look it up also

  19. Go to the corner and cry. Then either use the drawing function on Renshuu (phone and web app) or Kanji Study (phone app). They’re not as strict as Jisho

  20. In general that’s why I only do reviews at home, so I can always check it on Jisho.

    With time though (18 months in my case), you should be more familiar with radicals and not really needing jisho to always analyze them. That’s where vocabulary pick up also grow faster. Of course not applicable to all kanji, but after 4K words I also feel many many words just reeuse the same kanjis again and again, so for every 5 new cards I might have 1 or 2 new kanji max to learn.

  21. It depends what I’m focusing on, definitely. If I’m focusing on understanding every little nuance then if I can’t understand it from context I’ll look it up on Jisho using radical search like you. If I’m just trying to get a big picture idea of what a passage is about then I’ll try to sus it out, again via context, that failing I’ll move on, leaving a footnote for future me to come back later. That said I’m definitely on the lazy side, and it’s def best IMO to add it to an anki deck, especially if it’s of a lower frequency of use.

  24. When I’m reading Japanese books or manga, I use TextSniper to grab any tricky kanji straight from the page into my clipboard so I can paste it into Jisho instantly. It’s made the whole process way faster than drawing the characters by hand.

  25. I personally don’t care about individual kanji at all, I only look up words with yomitan. If for some reason I don’t know the kanji but I know the word, I won’t look it up.

    Though, of course if you don’t know the kanji almost always you also won’t know the word, so I have no choice but to look it up. But I’ll look up the definition of the word and the reading, not the individual kanji.

  26. if i wanna know what it means i use the handwriting keyboard and look it up on jisho. if i dont i just read “something” and move on

  28. I have a dictionary app (aptly named “japanese”) that i can just draw it and check out the meaning

  29. Reading on a computer/phone: copy/paste into google and add 漢字 if it doesn’t bring up kanji related results on the first try. Yomitan would be more efficient if you see new kanji often.

    Reading a book etc in my living room where my kanji dictionary lives: radical/stroke count index in the kanji dictionary 

    Reading a book etc elsewhere: jisho radical search on my phone (this is probably slightly faster than the kanji dictionary, but with less detailed entries)

    When I was actively learning the Jouyou kanji I would add new kanji to the next round of kanji and/or vocab flashcards once I’d encountered them multiple times, but now they’re usually pretty obscure so I treat them as optional trivia facts (if they stick they stick, if they don’t they don’t)

    When you say jisho takes a long time, do you mean for each individual kanji or because there are a lot of unknown kanji? 

    * Individual kanji: pay attention to stroke counts so you get faster, or use a handwriting or OCR based tool
    * Lots of kanji: OCR based tool and/or some dedicated kanji study if you’ll be looking up words in paper books a lot

  30. You are doing it the hard way, just take out google lens, take a picture of your kanji, (as screenshot or photo), let app analyse the picture. And BAM

    now copy paste result to jisho

    Google lens is also really good at recognizing handwritten text. (Makes it easier to read manga or sth, if there is handwritten text)

  32. I use Shirabe Jisho. This App lets you write the kanji on the screen and it will give you the most likely candidates. You just need to write the kanji by hand and it does not have to be perfect. When you tap one, it gives you its readings and meanings of the kanji.

  33. I use ocr or yomitan but when those 2 aren’t available, I’ll look up a kanji similar to it on some site that shows me similar kanji to whatever kanji I put in. If it’s not there then I’ll badly draw the character on some kanji search site and it usually works even though I know nothing about stroke order.

    If you’re reading physically, an ocr app on your phone might be your best best. I’ve never used it but heard that google lens or something can often grab the text of a page.

  34. Try the deep thinking mode.

    I’ve never used it for stroke order. I use it to find out what the kanji are. It’s never failed me so far. I always find my kanji.

  36. Shirabe Jisho lets you handwrite it, plus there’s a handwriting option on phone keyboards. No need to use the radical search.

    Funnily enough I’ve always found Chinese dictionaries and keyboards are way more forgiving when it comes to handwriting search.

  37. I draw it on google translate then go to jisho.org to get an in depth translation. Or I ignore it and just learn it later.

  38. I may be old fashioned, but I really feel like you’ll learn a lot looking it up in a paper dictionary. It’s how I first learned a lot of kanji, before people could just walk around with electronic OCR devices all the time. When I first came here, I would bring a dictionary on the train and just read all the adverts. Looked up every kanji I didn’t know in a paper dictionary. You end up learning a lot about kanji in general that way — other ones that share the same radical, various compounds, etc.

    Eventually I found that I wasn’t needing to look up as many, and I was getting through a lot more adverts during my ride on the subway.

  39. I’ve been using Zenbun to quickly get the kanji. I just point my phone at the book and immediately see the kanji’s furigana then I click on the word to see the meaning. Since it’s using OCR the accuracy isn’t always perfect but it works for me and it’s better than what I used to do, which was use Google lens to identity the kanji.

  40. Taking time to look it up through radicals is a great method to learn and actually remember it. Just hovering on top of it and seeing how it’s read and what it means, you’ll forget in ten seconds.

  41. If it seems important to the sentence, or has parts that I recognize (多い方), I’ll try and put together the meaning/reading. If I can’t figure it out then I handwrite it into Google/dictionary

  42. I take a picture and OCR it. If I need the meaning right now because I’m doing something that requires it I’ll throw it into machine translation with the context. Otherwise I use Nihongo and look it up as well as everything surrounding it and its other meanings and stuff.

    Nihongo is a good dictionary with good OCR support. I use it on my phone.

  43. If you take a picture of it you should be able to copy and paste into a dictionary.
    When I learned Japanese we didn’t have this function so I used to draw them out but no need to do that now

  45. A physical dictionary is guaranteed to make things far more slow and painful lol.

    In cases like this, it really pays off knowing how to handwrite. Even for unknown complicated kanji, it only really takes five seconds for me to scribble down something Gboard will recognize accurately.

    If you want to only use writing as a last resort, exploit phonetic components in kanji compounds for fairly accurate educated guesses. Not every kanji has this, but many do.

    You could also use Google Lens for the OCR functionality, but for me, getting the camera to focus on a tiny book with tiny print (as many Japanese novels and manga tend to be) and then copying and pasting the unknown word to a proper dictionary (because Google Translate still isn’t a dictionary) takes much more time and effort than writing or getting lucky with a guess.

    Though personally, I would prefer to do reading with lookups on a digital platform, and use physical books for reading without lookups. I did the latter much more than the former when learning English as a child, and I’m not entirely sure how and why I stopped doing that when learning Japanese as a teen moving forward (until recently).

  47. Try to “feel” out some meaning with the radicals I recognize and any context around it first. I find that if I get enough meaning I can connect it to at least a concept devoid of reading or flash remember some word from Anki and intake study that matches the concept. It’s not perfect for sure, some kanji just feels like random radicals and other kanji copy pasted together for nonsensically.

    Regardless, after trying to get some meaning without help I’ll check Jisho and see if I was close or totally off base. Once I have a solid feel for it’s meaning I’ll toss it in my Anki deck I use for words outside of basic vocab I’ve found and wanted to learn.

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