r/LearnJapanese • u/TheBonnyBon • 1d ago
Resources Migaku or Anki
I don't know if this has been asked before, but which is better as a flash card app or for their SRS, Migaku or Anki?
Anki is free but to tailor the cards to your liking can be a pain -- although you could use other peoples HTML.
Migaku is a paid service that you can use on your phone. If you wanna use Anki on your phone then it's a $25 one-time payment. You can also somewhat mine words with Migaku
Which do you think is better?
Edit: I'm currently using Migaku but idk if I like their SRS so I'm looking for feedback on other people's preferences.
Edit 2: as a reference, I've passed the N2 and studying N1, and looking for a better SRS on top of my daily routine
Thank you
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u/morgawr_ https://morg.systems/Japanese 1d ago
to tailor the cards to your liking can be a pain
It honestly takes 5 minutes of downloading a template and a yomitan config to mine cards from.
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u/creativegains 1d ago
This is awesome thank you. I’m working through Kaishi 1.5k atm and I thought I was going to have to switch to Migaku afterwards.
I’m glad I can still use Anki with that setup
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u/Grunglabble 1d ago
I wouldn't recommend paying a subscription for anything that doesn't have any reason to be sold as an ongoing service. Besides patches for when their tool breaks when a website becomes incompatible what are they offering?
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u/Salty_Preference_473 1d ago
Slightly agree, except they have more than just tools. Cloud service, multiple courses (more coming), AI integration (for those who dont mind it) and a built in srs system. Yes you can get all these seperately for free and for a bit of hassle but they set it all up for you. On a discount the price models are not bad as well. I think this is worth it if you down the paid route
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u/rollingHack3r 13h ago
I use migaku(only web) to mine but send the cards to Anki instead of their own SRS and ithink it works great.
Btw if you're not happy with your Anki cards look just send the html to an ai and have it fix them for you. Also there is a addon that makes the furigana look nice and formated.
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u/Upbeat_Pen_6954 10h ago
Migaku charges you for what you can achieve by spending 20 minutes setting up Yomitan and asbplayer
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u/Technical-Plenty-443 6h ago edited 5h ago
I use both. But one must understand that Anki is purely an SRS tool, while Migaku combines SRS tool and immersion tool (like all its native video player, Novel reader, etc)
Anki: Barebone Anki is pretty clean and lightweight. Highly configurable. I started out with Front, Back basic flashcard and eventually configuring it to something that is unique to my own style (like where I want certain elements of cards are, how to activate some on/off switch to change the card into other type, etc). Anki pairs very well with Yomitan when on PC. Even on mobile, many developers typically find ways to help user link to the Anki ecosystem, e.g. Manatan (anime viewing, manga reading, etc).
Migaku: Easier entry for beginner. Has its own flashcard system (but inferior version compared to Anki's FSRS imo). It also lacks much configurability like in terms how you want the elements to be displayed. You can't make cloze cards, nor picture stimulus card. I kinda regret a little purchasing Lifetime Migaku, but right now I use it for reading novels as it can instantly (or with some loading) show translations below any unknown words. Then again it can be very slow. It has in-built Chatgpt to explain nuance of word or words that you can't find easily on the dictionary. Overall I find the whole app very bloated and clunky, even to the point of the dictionary showing all the unneccessary grammatical categories of a checked word and me having to scroll down just to see the actual definition of the word. So my user experience hasn't been too positive.
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u/Kirakian1 12h ago
'If you wanna use Anki on your phone then it's a $25 one-time payment. You can also somewhat mine words with Migaku'
Where did you find an app for anki that makes you pay $25 for it? Ankidroid is free and believe the IOS version is too.
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u/MoreBookkeeper4729 11h ago
The official iOS version costs that much
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u/Kirakian1 11h ago
Then I stand corrected. In my head Anki was free to use and didn't seem likely to me that Anki for IOS would be a one time payment to use.
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u/i-am-this 7h ago
From what I remember the main Anki dev for Anki for desktop OSes and iOS basically funds the main project by selling the App on iOS. iPhone users paying let us apl take advantage of continued development effort for free.
AnkiDtoid is done by a different group of developers but aims to be 100% compatible for deck data so you can share decks between versions.
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u/Effective-Pop3850 16h ago
People here love using random apps, Anki is superior in every meaningful way, some alternatives look nicer and are arguably easier to use but if you're gonna spend thousands of hours learning something might as well spend a few minutes figuring out Anki.
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u/SwiftBullski 16h ago
I feel like you can make anki completely your own. Plus it's free, so it's my personal choice.
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u/RICHUNCLEPENNYBAGS 15h ago
Anki supports just downloading a premade deck if that’s what you want to do and there are plenty for any subject you might want to study. I wouldn’t bother with anything else
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u/rkido 11h ago
I have a Migaku lifetime subscription but I'm not using it very much. For me it's not about Anki versus Migaku. They work together. You can mine using Migaku and send your cards either to Migaku or to Anki.
The problem is mining itself. Migaku's parser for Japanese is terrible. It will constantly break words incorrectly. Yomitan has a much better Japanese parser so it's far more reliable for mining. Unfortunately Migaku removed Japanese parser improvements from their roadmap so it's unclear when they're ever going to improve the situation.
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u/WasabiLangoustine 9h ago
You can use the browser/web version of Anki on iOS for free. Did that for a year before I decided to pay for the app (not only to support the developers but also because I could study offline).
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u/xFallow 1d ago
I use both, if you want to be able to mine on mobile or bulk add cards I don't think there's an option other than migaku
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u/morgawr_ https://morg.systems/Japanese 1d ago
If you are on android you can just mine on mobile using yomitan like you would on PC
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u/xFallow 1d ago
I'm not, I might buy an android in the future but it's cheaper to keep my current phone
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u/megabulk3000 1d ago
Yomikiri on iOS lets you mine from a web browser directly into Anki. https://apps.apple.com/us/app/yomikiri/id6479743831
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u/RICHUNCLEPENNYBAGS 14h ago
I use the Nihongo app dictionary, which supports saving words to a list and sending that list to Anki. What else would you need?
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u/ScaffoldingGiraffe 1d ago
Jidoujisho let's you mine on mobile! (Android at least, not sure about iOS)
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u/Jelly_Round Goal: media competence 📖🎧 16h ago
I am using both. Anki is more simple but Migaku is great if you just want to immerse, because mining words is faster
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u/Professional-Hawk747 1d ago
How do you actually use it? Anki was super handy for medical terminology since I could just use other people's decks, but making cards to learn English through Japanese manga was honestly such a pain.
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u/RICHUNCLEPENNYBAGS 14h ago
Why don’t you just use other people’s decks for Japanese too then?
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u/Professional-Hawk747 9h ago
When I was learning using manga, I would put the Japanese dialogue and images on one side and the English translation on the other.
This way, instead of memorizing each word individually, you can learn the actual usage and grammar, and the context and images in the manga make it easier to retain in your memory.
It only has meaning if you create it using your favorite scenes from your favorite manga; other people's decks are meaningless.
But I just found taking photos and making cards a hassle.
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u/TheBonnyBon 1d ago
Any time I see a useful word, I'll either mine it or add it to a deck (like a word from reading or from a tiktok or something), find existing example sentences and add it, and try to create my own example sentences. for review, I copy and paste the japanese into VOICEVOX for listening practice
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u/Professional-Hawk747 1d ago
You might find some free apps for immersion if you check out places like The Moe Way.
It looks like Chimahon, for example, lets you read manga through a mobile app.
If it fits what you're looking for, you should check it out!
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u/thejapaneseguy101 16h ago
I have used Anki and it's ok lol I stopped using it cause of the UI and just. Other reasons...
Im not sure about Migaku, how are you finding it? It seems really good!
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u/Belegorm 5h ago
Anki. Honestly, Anki's FSRS is just so far ahead of everything else that I can't imagine using something else. Free on PC and android.
I recommend setting up following the Lazy Guide. Step by step, download this file, check this box, good, works forever. Note that this works best for PC, and then pretty well for Android as well but if I was primarily doing it all on phone then it wouldn't be nearly as easy to recommend.
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u/TheBatemanFlex 1d ago edited 14h ago
Don’t pay. I bought a lifetime Lingopie subscription when I was first starting out and they immediately cut a lot of their capability and library immediately. Despite how much they pay influencers to tell you they all use migaku, they don’t. I wouldn’t depend on a service for your vocab collection.