The Cunning Linguist

Anki

Anki is a free program designed to help you remember facts (such as words and phrases in a foreign language) as easily, quickly and efficiently as possible. Download the Anki application for Windows, Mac OS and Linux.

Anki Decks

Download pre-populated data files (Anki "decks") to assist with your language study. They are made available under an "Attribution-Noncommercial-ShareAlike" Creative Commons license. More decks will be added over time.

• Japanese
  
  • Hiragana & Katakana*
  • Minna no Nihongo 1: Vocabulary & Sentences - incomplete, last update: 20th Jul 2008
  • LiveMocha Japanese 101: Vocabulary & Sentences - incomplete, last update 20th Jul 2008
• Mandarin
  
  • HSK Level 1

* - Note these decks have a different model to the others available for this language, but it should still be possible to import them

How Anki works

Anki is based on a theory called "spaced repetition". Most people are aware that their ability to remember information improves when they are exposed to that information more than once. Each time you review information your ability to recall the information improves, and you will remember it for longer.

Spaced repetition software calculates how long you will remember new information, and monitors how quickly you are forgetting it. This allows the frequency with which information is presented to you to be fine-tuned. You see the information as often as you need to; before you forget, and with a long enough interval that you don't waste time reviewing what you know perfectly well already.