For those living in japan: is wanikani worth it versus just reading with a dictionary?

20 comments

1. If you’re N3, read. But also do [this app](https://www.emkfunlab.com/kanjitoon) on the side. 5-10 kanji a day.

2. You don’t like flashcards but are looking into WaniKani? They work pretty much the same except WaniKani isn’t customizable. Plus they make up definitions for radicals. Anki does things better and is free. That said you don’t have to do any type of SRS if you don’t want to. Reading manga with a dictionary is a good approach. Theres also a WaniKani deck for Anki but like you said, you hate Anki.

   I would look into the WaniKani book club though, its a free to use forum for book recommendations and reviews

3. WaniKani is very geared towards Kanji, much more so than vocabulary. It has vocabulary but it’s just there to reinforce the kanji, it’s often uncommon rarely used words. WaniKani also has a strict, slow progression that cannot be bypassed. It will likely take months before you get to kanji/words that you don’t know. Like the first few weeks will be 一人 二つ 入り口 level. Also you mention you don’t want flash cards, WaniKani is flash cards as much as Anki is.

   I’ll stop there as the rest of my advice is Anki which you don’t want (I get it, I hate it too, but it just works).

4. The problem with Wanikani is that it’s really slow, especially in the beginning so you will probably be waiting a lot or bored repeating the same easy kanji that you already know for weeks.

   If you are already N3, you are already like half a year ahead of what Wanikani can teach you level by level and since most of the content is based on earlier lessons it’s also complicated to skip levels.

5. Wait but doesnt wanikani use a anki-like system alongside the remembering the kanji ststem…
   I was in your shoes before (literally barely passed N3) and I stopped wanikani cause the kanjis I do and don’t know are so inconsistent. That’s why I preferred anki cause of the customization you can tailor for yourself. But also there’s lots of community made cards that have benefits.

   I used anki in short bursts, ironically not how it’s supposed to be used but for the kanji I see and use everyday it helped a lot. I’m tryna get back on anki so I can get around N2 kanji fluency via one of those N2 kanji decks.
   I would just read/watch and use anki to create those kanjis you REALLY can’t remember.

6. I’m similar in that I lived in Japan, vocab was my weak spot, and I hated flashcards. I wouldn’t recommend WaniKani for your situation since it’s a kanji resource, not a vocab resource. 

   I actually found my vocabulary improved the most by watching tv shows that cover topics with more complex vocab like medical or legal dramas. I learn vocab better from hearing it repeatedly than from reading, so that worked for me

7. Starting WK from level 1 at N3 is largely a waste of time. If you’re okay with going through the early levels to get to N3 level which is roughly around 30 give or take, then go for it. There’s plenty of ways to customize WK through their plugin system that you would have to learn how to use. There’s also a mobile app called Tsurukame which is nice to use and honestly better than WK on desktop. It’s WK but they added some nice customizations to it.

   WK doesn’t really teach you useful vocab. It also has no grammar at all. The only vocab it does teach is ones that use the kanji you are currently learning at the time to further reinforce it into you.

   It’s hard to recommend something that isn’t SRS but at N3 the most common recommendation is to just start reading. If reading isn’t your thing then watching Japanese content with Japanese subtitles. SRS has become the #1 formula for learning Japanese and rightfully so, but if that’s not a right fit for you then just commit to the immersion route however you can.

8. Trust me, Wanikani is significantly worse than Anki lol. Maybe you’ll do 100 Anki cards, but that same load would translate to like 300 Wanikani cards over a longer period of time- plus in Anki you can just press a button, in Wanikani you have to actually type out every single answer on your keyboard

   If you already hate Anki, Wanikani will just make you quit Japanese lol

9. I also dont like Wanikani but love the Mnemonics system they have. So what i did, is that i used their spreadsheet and used it as a dictionary to look up easier ways to remember kanji for free.

   Its a google search away, and its a spreadsheet with both radicals and kanjis with the latter having a column dedicated what radicals make it up.

   I get the best of both worlds without the pain of anko and for free

10. Started marumori , made me realize how locked down wanikani is. No redo feature, hardly any customization… While there are some good things to say about wanikani, well.

    So Anki, bunbro, marumori, kitsun ..

11. It is def way to late for wani if you’ve passed n3 already, you’d be suffering through a few months of Kanji and vocabulary you already know until you get to a point where you’d actually start learning things again. Just find some Anki deck that has what your looking for, no need to build one yourself.

12. I don’t live in Japan but I re-did WK in the run-up to taking N2, having previously bowed at level 40 ish. I basically didn’t learn anything for the first 36 levels and then learnt a bunch of kanji that I haven’t ever seen in the real world and loads of unnecessary vocabulary about baseball and battleships. I rage quit it again as soon as I’d reached the point where I’d covered all the N2 kanji, and gained back a significant amount of time I could spend reading each day instead. 

13. I seriously, highly recommend automated vocab card creation with Anki and a browser plugin like Yomitan. When reading something online/in browser, you can hover over a word and click **once** on the Yomitan pop-up and it will generate the Anki card for you. It’s extremely easy and no pain at all.

    https://lazyguidejp.github.io/jp-lazy-guide/setupAnki/

    Even if you’re reading physical media, all you have to do is lookup the word in browser, hover and click. It’s helpful if you find an example sentence online (e.g. via jpdb), since the setup will automatically include the sentence in the Anki card.

    I was in a very similar situation to you – passed N3 years ago, stagnated, and felt that my vocab was holding me back (it was). This has been the most helpful for me in getting my vocab to a good place.

    I also recommend setting up the AutoReorder plugin to sort your Anki cards by frequency, so you are always learning the most frequent words you’ve picked up. For example, if you added 光合成 (because you wanted to learn it), and then later added 抵抗, the latter would show up in your new cards first because it is more common. This way, you are filling in the gaps in your vocab by order of frequency.

14. If you have iOS or macOS I made a tool for learning through reading whatever you enjoy: https://reader.manabi.io

15. If you are an Android user, there’s a good app just called “Kanji”. They have some very good reader add-ins for vocab and kanji in context. For both Android and iOS, the Todai app is good for general vocabulary expansion through news and article reading.

    If you want non-app suggestions, books focussing on reading comprehension (読解) are best. The Nihongo Sou Matome and Nihongo Kanzen Master series are JLPT focussed. コーロケションで増やす and 読解を深める　現代文単語 are less test-oriented.

16. Hi! As others have mentioned, Wanikani wouldn’t really be worth it for you. At best, you’d be leveling up at about one level per week, and you’re already waaaay past that (you’d need to be around level 28–30 to actually feel challenged) So, it would take about 7–8 months of daily grinding just to get there.

    You’re well beyond this, but I’ll plug anyway:

    👉 [https://kanji-sensei.com](https://kanji-sensei.com)

    It’s currently in beta, with N5 content available for free (you’re past that) but N4–N1 should be out within the next 8–12 months, so it could be worth keeping an eye on! Here’s our [Discord](https://discord.gg/FkGeBfsP4w)

    This site lets you:

    * Start at any level
    * Skip ahead or go back
    * Customize your mnemonics
    * Practice reading
    * Use vocab and grammar in context
    * Create custom decks
    * Learn with helpful artwork!

    https://preview.redd.it/3gaz9gkbj5qf1.jpeg?width=983&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e3f796f1fcf788c51a9927520ce0e610b13a5650

17. you cannot skip levels on Wanikani, so you will be bored for a signicant time.

18. I have my gripes with WaniKani, but putting those aside, I don’t think it’s right for you. It’s basically a flash card website designed for absolute beginners with no Kanji knowledge at all. If you passed N3 years ago, most of what it offers is redundant. If you just need help with vocab, a dictionary and/or Anki are probably the best options. That, and lots of reading.

19. In terms of theory, the idea behind vocabulary cards (and wanikani, I suppose) is that you prep yourself for reading smoothly. You get the foundation from cards and then build it up through context. It’s not that after a card, you know the word and that’s it, it’s preparing you for actual usage and making it easier to transition.

    There’s also an efficiency component in that you can study more used words.

    Reading with a dictionary is decent. I’d say the problems are with fun (it may not be fun to stop every few minutes and look up like a single noun) and frequency (God forbid you have to look it up again because you forgot). Depending on the word it might not even be used all that often, or it might carry context you’re not familiar with (a lot of novels have vocab mostly used in literary contexts and I’ve never heard anyone actually say them in conversation).

    I lived in Japan, I feel like the main difference between those improving and those who don’t are how much you’re willing to grind to learn, and not just hand wave off things if you don’t know. And it happens at all levels. I had my N1 and knew people who didn’t and they would grind the hell out of Japanese with interactions and noting down things they didn’t remember and they got a lot better than me.

20. Sorry for the self-promo. But if you only want to learn kanji, you can use [shodoku.app](http://shodoku.app) you can start with N3 kanji if you know all your N5-N4 kanji.

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