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Japanese

Top 25 YouTube Channels For Learning Japanese – Beginner To Advanced

YouTube is a goldmine of Japanese language lessons and listening practice. Whether you’re looking for grammar breakdowns, non-textbook language, beginner vocabulary, or advanced-level Japanese debates on current affairs, you’ll find it here – and for free.

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Mondly Review – Made Significant Improvements Made in 2022

Mondly

Rating 2.7

Summary

Mondly is a language-learning app that teaches basic vocabulary and grammar structures. It seems most appropriate for learners with little to no exposure to their target language.

The activities mostly rely on passive recognition of vocabulary and phrases, and therefore are not very challenging. However, they are varied enough that you probably wouldn’t get bored with short, daily practice sessions.

Although I wouldn’t recommend Mondly to anyone looking to seriously learn a language, it may be appropriate for individuals studying languages with less available resources, or for individuals who are preparing to travel abroad.


Quality 3.0

Both the interface and the course itself could be designed better. *Edited on Nov 22* It has made many improvements this year. We will update soon.

Thoroughness 2.5

It’s decent for learning vocabulary, but I thought a lot of the material wasn’t explained very well.

Value 3.0

It’s fairly inexpensive.

I Like
  • Daily lessons, weekly quizzes, and monthly challenges – these functionalities encourage you to practice every day.
  • The vocabulary included is useful and drilled in an effective way.
  • It’s fairly inexpensive.
I Don’t Like
  • The content and exercises are the same for all levels and languages.
  • The exercises are mostly passive.
  • I don’t think the order of lessons and topics is very well thought out.
  • For me, the interface is not user friendly and the platform is visually unappealing.
Price

There are three plans… $9.99 per month for one language $47.99 per year ($4/mo) for one language and $99.99 for lifetime.

Spring Sale! Get 96% off Lifetime Access to Mondly Premium, plus bonus access to Mondly AR & Mondly Kids! See details on the website. Offer ends on 4/30/24.

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Miageru Mini Review: Useful for Drilling Beginner Japanese

Miageru

Rating 3.3
Price:

Free

Summary

Fun fact: miageru means to raise your eyes upwards, to admire, or to respect. Yet it’s not entirely clear why this course is named Miageru, or who is supposed to be looking up to whom (or what). Miageru contains basic, easy-to-understand explanations for beginner-level Japanese kana and grammar. It also has games to help you drill kana, kanji, vocabulary, and grammar. However, you’ll only learn how to recognize kana and kanji, not how to write them. While a useful tool, Miageru is not the most well-organized platform. There’s no learning pathway, for example, and neither is there a section on essential Japanese phrases (greetings, directions, etc.). When we tried it out, there was no way to even learn how to say hello and introduce yourself. To study kanji, you have to select sentences that you’re interested in learning. Studying a kanji in a sentence isn’t a bad idea: learning things in context will help you remember them. Yet this system does mean that you might learn things in an odd order. Miageru claims it’s a replacement for Japanese courses and includes everything you need to know for JLPT N5. We’re not convinced because it misses out a lot of essential phrases. However, it’s a helpful supplementary resource for drilling beginner Japanese alongside a course or textbook.

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Japanese From Zero! Mini Review: Slow, Easy, Fun Textbooks

Japanese From Zero!

Rating 2.5
Price:

From $25/volume

Summary

If you’re looking for an easy introduction to Japanese, you might like Japanese From Zero! It is engagingly written and has lots of information about Japanese culture, but it teaches the language at a snail’s pace. In fact, it reminds us of storybooks designed to teach young children foreign languages, in that it mixes kana with romaji. You’ll see words written half in hiragana, half in romaji. And the entire first textbook won’t teach you any katakana or kanji at all. There’s also an accompanying video course, YesJapan (review), which contains a ton of useful material. Ironically, in this course, kana and kanji are used. For serious learners, we think there are better textbooks out there, such as Genki and Minna no Nihongo. But if you’re looking for the textbook equivalent of Duolingo, you might like Japanese From Zero! It’s an easy, fun way to learn the language while never feeling overwhelmed. You’ll make extremely slow progress – but it will still be progress.

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Minna no Nihongo Mini Review: Thorough Japanese Textbooks

Minna no Nihongo

Rating 4.7
Price:

From $35 per volume

Summary

Minna no Nihongo, along with Genki, is one of the most recommended Japanese textbooks you can find – and it lives up to expectations. There are two beginner-level (shokyu) volumes that roughly correlate to A1–A2 or N5–N4 and two intermediate-level (chokyu) volumes that should take up to N2. Each textbook contains 25 chapters and will teach you grammar, vocabulary, and more. They also come with a CD. Minna no Nihongo’s main selling point, especially at the beginner level, is that it’s generally more in-depth than other popular textbooks. Compared to Genki, it has more vocabulary and grammar, more exercises, and more accompanying workbooks, including ones specifically for kanji, reading, and writing. That said, many students are put off by the lack of English in the main textbook. They are entirely in Japanese. You can buy the official Translation and Grammar Notes for each level in a variety of languages, including English, Mandarin, and Spanish. While purchasing two separate texts can be annoying, it also has its positives: you’re pushed to try to understand the Japanese first, plus it makes it more accessible for people who don’t have English as a first language. You should also learn the kana before getting started with Minna no Nihongo. If you’ve yet to study this, apps like Skritter (review), Scripts (review), and LingoDeer (review) will help you pick it up. If you’re planning to move to Japan, or want to learn the language as thoroughly as possible, then Minna no Nihongo is a great starting point. You’ll get a strong understanding of the grammar and learn a lot of vocabulary. However, if you’re looking for an easier entry point or don’t want to buy the official translation, check out our review of Genki.

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Wasabi Mini Review: Japanese Classes & Self-Study Lessons

Wasabi Mini Review: Japanese Classes & Self-Study Lessons

Rating 4.2
Price:

3,780¥/month

Summary

Wasabi is an online Japanese school that also publishes an impressive amount of free resources for beginner and intermediate learners. This includes grammar guides, graded readers with audio recordings, video lessons, and other self-study materials. The online classes are one-to-one and typically taught in Japanese, although they will allocate you a teacher who speaks English if you request it. You need to purchase the classes in monthly packs, with a minimum of two per month. There’s no upper limit. Meanwhile, you can study by yourself without classes using their self-study materials – although, of course, you’ll miss out on the practice opportunities and personalized feedback. These materials are written in English and contain clear, easy-to-follow breakdowns of Japanese grammar, pronunciation, and more. There are no exercises, however, so you’ll have to drill the material on your own. Whether you take classes with them or not, Wasabi is worth bookmarking. There’s an enormous amount of free, quality resources for beginner and intermediate-level Japanese students. You could use them to supplement courses and textbooks or even to structure your independent studies.

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Japanese For Busy People Mini Review: Not That Great

In this post we review Japanese For Busy People. It’s not my top pick for learning Japanese, and here’s why….

Japanese For Busy People

Rating 2.5
Price:

From $27/volume

Summary

Japanese For Busy People is a popular textbook series, but unless you’re set on learning business vocabulary, we think there are better books available. The biggest issue with this series is that you won’t learn how to write Japanese in the standard version, which only uses romaji. This not only makes it impossible to read or write, but also means learning the pronunciation is much harder. You can purchase a kana version of the textbook instead, but even that doesn’t teach kanji until the second volume. The grammar explanations are quite superficial, while the vocabulary is limited and tends to be business-oriented. If you’re learning Japanese to travel, watch anime, or study in Japan, you might become frustrated with the material. In its favor, it includes a variety of exercises and practice drills. However, we believe there are better Japanese textbooks available. We recommend trying Genki or Minna no Nihongo instead.

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Samidori Mini Review: Free Online Japanese Course

Samidori

Rating 3.7
Price:

Free

Summary

samidori is a free online Japanese course from the University of Kyoto, and as you might expect, it’s a comprehensive, well-organized introduction to the language. There is an extensive range of lessons from absolute beginner up to lower intermediate. They cover the kana, grammar, vocabulary, listening, and reading. However, there are no writing or speaking activities, and although you’ll learn to recognize them, you won’t be taught how to write any kanji. Higher levels also contain fewer lessons than the lower levels. Most of the lessons follow the same format: the lesson topic and vocabulary are introduced in both Japanese and English, then there are example sentences, audio recordings for the vocabulary and example sentences, and finally practice questions. For beginners, samidori is a decent introduction to Japanese, although you’ll want to pair it with kanji studies and writing and speaking practice. Intermediate learners, however, will likely want to use it as a supplementary resource only.

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