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.