A Sneak Peek At Our Upcoming Kanji Learning Site: WaniKani

April 26, 2012 by Koichi 122 Comments

We’ve been moderately quiet about the kanji learning site WaniKani. Since it’s getting close to private alpha time (if you get the 30 Day Ebook there’s a link in there for previously said private alpha) I wanted to shed some details on the project that Viet’s been so hard at work on all these months. Of course, since it’s quite early everything I’m about to say is liable to change, but don’t you want to know more anyways?

All In The Name

wanikani name

Perhaps the hardest part about building WaniKani was coming up with a name. It seemed like every day in January we were just listing off name after name after name, trying to come up with something we liked. Here are some failed names:

iheartkanji.com
kanjikan.com
kanjithehardway.com
kanjify.com
kanjimaster.com
narwhalapp.com

Yeah. Those are pretty bad. On one fateful day, though, I opened a kanji dictionary up to the fish (魚) section (yeah, there’s a fish section, seriously) and wrote down all of the aquatic animal names since most of our stuff seems to be sea-creature themed. I was looking for two animals that had rhyming names. The only two I came across were a match made in heaven: Wani (alligator) and Kani (Crab).

Of course, the moment we tried imagining what the mascot would look like we were sold. CRABIGATOR. ALLICRAB. WANIKANI.

What Is WaniKani?

The idea behind WaniKani is nice and simple. Basically, we wanted to create something that we’d actually use to learn kanji and vocab. In order to do that, we would have to cover five main things:

Kanji Radicals
Kanji Meanings
Kanji Readings (we narrow it down to the most important one for you so you don’t have to learn a million readings per kanji)
Vocabulary Meaning
Vocabulary Reading

That’s a lot of stuff, but each item on the list is helped by the item before it. For example, a kanji’s meaning comes from the radicals. A vocab’s meaning comes from the kanji that makes it. Etc. Learn them all and you’ll be able to read Japanese. Although this constitutes a lot of items to learn, our goal is to give people to ability to learn all of these within a year. We’re thinking 50 weeks, actually. That way you can take two weeks off for Columbus Day, or something.

Mnemonics, SRS, & Simplicity

As you might expect, learning kanji on WaniKani involves mnemonics, SRS, and a few pounds of simplicity thrown in for good measure. The mnemonics are all made in-house, and also cover the vocabulary (which, I think, is pretty unheard of). When you’ve proven to the computer monster that you’ve learned a new item (radical, kanji, or vocab), it gets put into your review pile. Once they’re in your review pile the SRS kicks in and then based off your answers it will show you the question more often or less often. We’ll definitely be testing and adjusting the “spaces” part of our “spaced repetition system” too when testing begins.

The most important thing for us, though, was the simplicity and ease of use. There are a few similar things out there, but usually it involves combining multiple (complicated) resources into one giant rat king of kanji learning. While combining multiple resource types into one application is a good start, we also wanted to be careful not to let that over-complicate things. Every time we try to add something (Viet’s very good at this) we ask each other what it will do and if it is actually necessary. If it’s not, we cut it. If it is, we then try to shave that feature down to the bare minimum while not losing its purpose. We want to make WaniKani a pleasure to use, above everything else.

Find Out More!

Over the coming weeks I’ll be posting more about WaniKani, but mostly on WaniKani-related sites (sometimes on Tofugu too, though). If you’d like to know more about this project, be sure to follow us via your favorite following service.

Blog: http://blog.wanikani.com
Twitter: @WaniKaniApp
Facebook: http://facebook.com/wanikani/

You can also sign up for access to the closed Beta (don’t have a timeline for that, but it’ll be after the Alpha) by going to the WaniKani homepage and clicking on the giant 鰐蟹. It’ll then let you put your email in. When the beta is ready, we’ll let you know about it. Of course, if you are dying to get in a little bit earlier, getting a copy of the 30 Day Ebook will give you a link to sign up for the Alpha.

In today’s post, I only went over some of the broad, general details on WaniKani. I’ll be diving into specifics over the next few weeks, but if you have any questions in the meantime put them in the comments below and I’ll answer the ones that I can!

About Koichi

Tries too hard to be a hoopy frood who knows where his towel's at. Wants to change the way people think about learning. Makes: Tofugu, TextFugu, and WaniKani. Follow him: @Twitter, Facebook, Instagram.

http://www.tofugu.com koichi

There’ll be a yearly that doesn’t recur with a discount, but not a forever I’m afraid.
http://www.twitter.com/christaran Chris Taran

I guess this is how I learned the Japanese I do know, I assume that people know that “inu” means dog before they ever learn the kanji for dog. I thought vocabulary usually gets learned in kana first, then you learn the kanji. So if you already know inu means dog, then when you ask what the dog kanji means, I would think to answer “inu” not “dog”.

Like if I were to ask a foreign learner of Japanese what does “&” mean, I would expect them to answer “and” and not “と”.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1567001652 Jamal Antonio

Oh cool, at that price I’ll deffo sign up, are you thinking of a lifetime membership like textfugu too?

+Props to viet!
http://twitter.com/hello_peep ジェシーアーン

God I love you people! I seriously cant wait for this! Thanks for all you do!

Looks like I’m going to have to start pimping this out in my Japanese class like I do for Textfugu. XD
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

So, you have to learn both. And you have to learn multiple readings. You can blame the Chinese and their shifting language for that.

Best way I’ve found is to learn the meaning of the kanji and then use the meaning to learn the reading. It’s about connecting one memory to the next memory.

On TextFugu / WaniKani I cut down the readings you have to learn by quite a bit, usually limiting it to one on’yomi and one kun’yomi. Then you only have to associate one with the kanji.

You just have to get used to it being this complicated, I’m afraid. It’s a very different kind of reading and writing system, and requires a lot more time, but when you put the time and effort in you get a lot back in the end, I think.
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

There are a lot of kanji out there. I think it’s probably safe to assume that people learn いぬ before they learn 犬… but the better you get hte more often that you learn words via kanji instead of kana. There are too many synonyms in Japanese to learn via kana effectively. Kanji is the way to go, and you should do it as early as possible otherwise it’ll hold everything else back.
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

D’awww, thank you!
http://www.twitter.com/christaran Chris Taran

Ok, I just need to dive in and give it another solid attempt and not let my mental block of “this is too hard!” stop me!
Xsuna

YES, just yes, you guys are friction’ gods. I couldn’t get TextFugu, and learn the kanji in the order you gave then, so this is epic.

PS. Will there be a cost? I’m kinda too young to pay for stuff online.
Reptic

For the kanji meaning thing, I think it has something to do with the fact that each individual kanji has its own intended meaning not associated with the exact word used in Japanese of the same meaning. For example, one could say the kanji “女” means woman in Japanese, but it means woman in Chinese as well despite each language having its own word for “woman”. So “女” doesn’t intrinsically mean おんな, it just means the concept of woman/female. For native English speakers its easier to understand this in English. There’s probably a better explanation out there, but this is just how I see it.
isocracy

Stoked for this - especially as I get to Alpha stage it! See Anki.. It’s ok – i’m sure it’s a proven SRS and everything, it’s just a bit.. boring..
Pretty much everything that comes from the hand’s of Koichi&Co is usually pure gold!
Massive anticipation for another way to fill my head with all that Kanji goodness! ^_^

Although.. I expect Mister to want this as part of his textfugu membership already :D
isocracy

Thats ok.. you can just send me your money and i’ll… “pay for you”
Jateku

Well, I’ve never really had a problem with Kanji…My problems have been with the listening comprehension side of things…
Have you ever heard of this (http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/10000-hours-building-listening-comprehension) I’ve been using this method for listening comprehension(You should write a post about it o0o)
Anyway, Like you said the secret to learning Japanese = A bit of hard work and dedication(And maybe a 鰐蟹) Lol
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=731397337 Miriam Shimamura

Thanks Koichi. I’ll probably still do the Textfugu, and see how that goes for me, then perhaps add the Wanikani too. I do like your conversational style of teaching, keeps it interesting, which is a key part of language learning I’d say! I haven’t made this much progress in a long time ^_^
ZXNova

This is very good, Will Wanikani teach all the Jouyou and Jinmeiyou Kanji?
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

Will be doing monthly and yearly (yearly doesn’t recur automatically though). I think we’ll probably do yearly with a month or two off monthly or something like that.
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

I’m glad to hear! :D
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

Really? Should send out one a week automagically for a few months at least
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

First level’s free, after that I’m afraid it paid :(
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

kekekeke – I hope it’s entertaining – very simple at the moment, though! Hoping to add more crazy stuff as time goes by though… like unlocking comic book pages of the WaniKani backstory, etc… one step at a time…
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

Joyo = yes (with some adjustments and changes to the list that I think make things more useful).

Jinmeiyou = Not now, but someday, perhaps, because they are really hard to learn but very useful. It would make up some kind of separate / advanced section or something after the Joyo, I’d imagine.
Mrgotswat

Will Wanikani have all the joyo kanji in it or will More kanji be added in later Through updates?
Francesca Murphy

Any chance of a color that doesn’t blind you or give you a headache? I am looking forward to trying WaniKani, but that shocking pink will probably keep me away.
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

I don’t really know the answer to that, but there are other colors too… I kind of screencapped all the pink parts, for some reason…
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

updates. But we’ve got it timed out where we’ll always be staying ahead of the SRS, so that way you don’t run out until the joyo kanji run out.
H1273190

i dont want to offend/ upset someone. I like tofugo and its content. Maybe someone could answer my questions please.

What makes Textfugu and wanikanji so good that people prefer it to eg. Anki + Kanjidamage from the tokyo damage report and pay subscritions? Its a free market and everyone has to pay his rent. i dont critic the price system. im just interested why the users/ betatesters use it instead of a free alternative. ty
Toms Jensen

Maybe add a function that allows you to change the color of the site in your user profile section.
boxie

I’m a complete newb when it comes to “anything” kanji wise, so would wanikani still be good for me?
p.s. I really want to put that wanikani on a t-shirt.
Hen BanKeN

This seems great. I’m SO excited about the idea!

You guys, are awesome =) thank you so much~

And greetings from Chile!
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

I think those are all good, and I think all of those work well for a lot of people. I’m going for a better experience here, is all.

Better mnemonics (at least I think they are, but mnemonic quality can be left to opinion) + everything together + simpler experience = faster learning.

That being said, I think it’s just going to come down to preference and what people consider a better experience.
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

I hope it will be – first level will be free, so you can find out.
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

Yay! THanks!

P.S. Why’s your country so long? Stop that.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1567001652 Jamal Antonio

Ok sweet, thanks koichi. Kanji is the hardest part of the language for me, but I do like them :) So this website will be great! I’m looking forward to it!
Hokkaido Kuma

I want this.
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

Awesome! I really hope it ends up helping a lot! :D
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

Oh, and I also really want a tshirt of this… what a good idea…
Saikou

My biggest problem with the Tofugu Kanji was how arbitrary a lot of the radical names seemed to be, as though you just made up names based on the shape and stuck with it.

That’s a completely fine method and it works from what I can tell, but I think it would be better if the names actually had some relations to what they meant in the context of the kanji itself.

I use the book “Kanji ABC” for my kanji mnemonic needs, and the nice thing about it is that a lot of research has gone in to the origin of the strokes and the meanings that each radical has. There are a few leaps in logic for certain kanji meanings but for the most part I find they make quite cohesive sense, and most importantly, the meaning seems to be consistent, almost to the point that I could make a good guess towards the meaning of new kanji based on the radicals.

Will Wanikani’s radical names be based on their meaning for the sake of logical understanding or their shape for the sake of mnemonics?
Tom

Buy the book anyway. Lots of good info in it, even if you’ve already been going for more than 30 days.
I have no affiliation with this site, btw.
http://twitter.com/PinkStarhime シドニー

So looking forward to this! It does remind me just a bit of readthekanji :D
henderson101

The name “wanikani” disturbs me, as it sounds like “wanker”.
Merodi

This makes me incredibly ドキドキ
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

So, some of the radical names I use do come from the 250ish original Chinese radicals (which I’m guessing Kanji ABC) uses. When I’m able to, I do that, but a few things keep me from doing it always:

1. Sometimes the meanings of the original radicals are very broad and difficult to use in a mnemonic. For mnemonics, I generally want to use nouns when I can, particularly nouns that are very unique, so they don’t get mixed with anything else. So, if the original doesn’t come close to meeting those criteria, I change it to something else based on the shape. I want the radicals to be easy to remember and use in mnemonics above anything else.

2. A lot of the radicals I use aren’t in the original 250. There’s a lot of radicals in kanji which aren’t covered, so I’m creating something entirely new that doesn’t officially exist but shows up a decent amount within various kanji. So, when that happens I just have to make something up anyways.

So, it probably won’t fit what you want in terms of how radicals work, but I can at least offer an explanation as to why I do it this way and not the other way. Other way has perks too, but this happens to be the way that works for me the best!
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

It’ll be pretty different. I’d say they actually would go fairly nicely together with only minimal overlap.
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

Sounds like I’ve done my job, then. *dusts off hands*
http://www.tofugu.com koichi

… and every time someone clicks it, a new moving gif of a unicorn appears to offset the dulling of colors? I. Want. Thisssss.
Erick Reilly

I love the illustrations! And I’ll definitely look into WaniKani the Web site!
http://twitter.com/shollum Shollum

It won’t let me reply to your last comment, so I’ll put it here.

My advice, if you’re having trouble remembering everything about a kanji, is to just screw the readings. They’re inconsequential in the long run. Though it can be helpful, I think it’s easier to just learn readings via vocabulary. You have to learn that vocabulary word anyway, so why not skip the horrible kanji drilling.

Another big thing for if you are learning kanji the way you do with Textfugu, WaniKani, Heisig’s RTK, etc. by learning the simplest forms first and building from there, is that you just keep trucking. Don’t stop forever to drill that one kanji. When I was segmenting my study like that, it made me feel like I just couldn’t do it.

Since these types of programs are meant to build off of what you already know, you will be reviewing as you move forward. I’m not saying that if you just read RTK cover to cover you’ll know the kanji just like that, but if you allow yourself to get caught at one spot, then you’ll never move forward.

Also, focus on one thing at a time. Until WaniKani is released, you’ll have to learn readings of most every kanji on your own. Don’t waste your time finding the most common reading or learning all the readings. Focus on the meaning first. After that, you can start vocabulary where you’ll either pick the readings up naturally (eventually) as you learn new vocabulary or be forced to look the reading up anyway.

Like it’s stated in this sites review of RTK1 (quoted):
“Even though I say it only really covers around 10% of what you need to
know about each kanji, it doesn’t mean that 10% won’t normally take you a
long time. That ten percent can be blasted through in a month using
this book (versus years using traditional methods)”

Oh, and apparently, multitasking makes you even less efficient at tasks than being under the influence of marijuana. So take things one at a time.

Sorry for being so long winded, but I don’t want to see someone quit before they’ve even really started.

Good luck on your studies!
Roentgen Del Mundo

looking forward to see this one, I’m a busy person and I find it hard to enroll myself in a decent japanese language school. Excited much hehe
Litchickuk

Looking forward to finding out more in the future
http://www.twitter.com/christaran Chris Taran

I just wanted to thank you very much for this comment. It has done a lot to convincing me to give kanji another try. I just need to stop thinking that associating kanji with English meanings is somehow bad.

I see people repeatedly praise RTK, so why I stubbornly have avoided it all these years is just plain silly of me. Learning /something/ about these kanji is better than literally nothing.

Again, thank you for this desperately needed motivation boost! :)