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Updated August 8, 2026

WaniKani Alternative: Learn Kanji Through Words, Not Levels

The short version: if you want a WaniKani alternative that teaches kanji through the words you will actually meet first, Moji - Learn Japanese Daily for iPhone orders 7,435 words by frequency rather than by kanji level, and kanji arrive inside the words that use them. WaniKani starts from radicals, builds kanji out of those radicals, then unlocks vocabulary built from those kanji, across 60 levels. It is free through level 3 and costs USD 9.00 per month, USD 89.00 per year, or USD 299.00 once for Lifetime after that. Moji’s free tier covers the entire comprehension path with no level gate, and Premium is $4.99 per month or $29.99 per year for focused practice modes.

If your goal is 2,000 kanji as a project in its own right, WaniKani is still the better tool, and there is a whole section below saying exactly why.

What WaniKani actually does

WaniKani is a browser-based kanji course built around a single, very consistent mechanic. You learn radicals, the visual components of characters. Radicals unlock kanji: “All kanji in WaniKani are based off of radicals you learned and reviewed.” Kanji then unlock vocabulary, since “Getting any kanji to ‘Guru’ status will also unlock vocabulary based off that kanji.” Getting 90% of a level’s kanji to Guru unlocks the next level, and there are 60 levels.

Items move along fixed SRS stages, Apprentice through Guru, Master, Enlightened, and Burned, with published intervals: 4 hours, 8 hours, 1 day, 2 days, 1 week, 2 weeks, 1 month, then 4 months. WaniKani’s own site describes the outcome as 2,000 kanji and 6,000 vocabulary words in just over a year.

That design has a real virtue that is easy to undersell. Because every kanji is decomposed into components you have already drilled, and because the level gate refuses to let you run ahead of your own accuracy, the course is almost impossible to do badly. The pacing is the product.

How Moji orders vocabulary by frequency instead of by level

Moji has no levels. It has one hand-edited study order over 7,435 words, derived from frequency data and then adjusted by hand where the raw ranking taught something in an unhelpful order.

That difference shows up immediately in the particles. Core grammar particles are deliberately pulled forward: は enters around position 63, が around 89, か around 109, and を around 129, each introduced with an example sentence chosen to show where the particle sits in a real sentence. A kanji-first course cannot front-load は, because は is kana and carries no kanji to unlock. A frequency-first course has to, because you cannot read a single ordinary sentence without it. More on the reasoning in why word order matters and the most common Japanese words.

Every entry carries a curated example sentence with an English meaning, and the sentences have a stated difficulty budget rather than a vibe. For study slots 151 to 586, each example uses at most one word the learner has not yet been taught at that slot, with katakana loanwords exempt. Slots 1 to 150 satisfy a looser three-band budget. Details in example sentence difficulty.

How Moji teaches kanji through words

In Moji, a kanji is not a separate item type with its own queue. You meet 電車 (でんしゃ, train) as a word, and the mnemonic for it breaks the characters into their components right there, at the moment you have a reason to care. 5,300 of the 7,435 entries have hand-written mnemonics. Kana-only words never get one, because there is nothing to decompose.

This is a genuine trade. WaniKani’s approach gives you a component vocabulary you can reuse on characters you have never seen, which is a real superpower for reading in the wild. Moji’s approach gives you a usable word on day one and a character that arrives attached to a meaning and a sentence. Neither is a trick; they optimise for different first years. The mnemonic conventions are written up in the kanji mnemonic method and best kanji app with mnemonics.

Moji vs WaniKani: a direct comparison

WaniKaniMoji - Learn Japanese Daily
Starting unitRadicals, then kanji, then vocabularyWords, in frequency order
Ordering60 fixed levelsOne hand-edited frequency order over 7,435 words
Pacing gate90% of a level’s kanji at Guru unlocks the next levelNo gate; the scheduler serves what is due
SchedulerFixed SRS stages (Apprentice to Burned)FSRS-6, all 21 parameters, 90% target retention
GradingTyped answers per itemTwo-button swipe: left for again, right for good
Content size2,000 kanji, 6,000 vocabulary (per WaniKani)7,435 words, all with example sentences
Example sentencesIncluded with vocabularyEvery entry, with a stated untaught-word budget
Pitch accentNot part of the core system7,029 entries annotated
Writing practiceNot part of the core systemKanji and kana stroke practice (KanjiVG data)
PlatformWeb browseriPhone only, iOS 18.0+
Free tierLevels 1 to 3Full comprehension path, no level limit
Paid$9/mo, $89/yr, $299 Lifetime$4.99/mo or $29.99/yr

The scheduling difference: fixed stages vs FSRS-6

WaniKani’s intervals are a shared ladder. Every item that reaches Guru 1 waits one week, whoever you are and whatever that item is. It is predictable, and predictability is part of why the system feels sturdy.

Moji runs the official FSRS-6 formulas with all 21 parameters and a target retention of 90%, so each card carries its own stability and difficulty and gets its own next interval. Grading is two buttons, swipe left for again and swipe right for good, which is a deliberate simplification of FSRS-6’s four grades: fewer buttons means faster reviews and no grade anxiety. There is no daily review cap, so everything due is served. See how FSRS works in Moji, memory bands and retrievability, and why we removed the review cap.

Worth being straight about one thing: Anki also offers FSRS as an optional scheduler. Moji’s difference is FSRS-6 with zero setup, not exclusive access to the algorithm. If you want that comparison specifically, see Anki alternative for Japanese.

What each one costs

WaniKani: free through level 3, then USD 9.00 per month, USD 89.00 per year, or USD 299.00 for a one-time Lifetime account, all before tax or VAT at checkout. Lifetime is an unusual option and genuinely good value if you intend to finish all 60 levels, which takes most people more than a year.

Moji: the free tier is the full comprehension path, permanently. Flashcards with mnemonics and example sentences, kana writing practice, vocab and kana quizzes, and the Daily Mix are all free. Premium, $4.99 per month or $29.99 per year, unlocks focused practice modes: listening, cloze, weak-words drills, kanji writing, and the full quiz library. Nothing free is later taken away.

Choose WaniKani if…

Be honest with yourself about which of these describes you, because for several of them WaniKani wins outright.

Choose Moji if…

What Moji is not

Moji is not the similarly named “Moji - Learn Japanese & Kanji” from another developer. It is iPhone-only, English-interface, made by one independent developer, and it uses FSRS-6 rather than the older SM-2 scheduling that most flashcard apps still ship. The dictionary base is JMdict from EDRDG, frequency ordering comes from JPDB data, and stroke data is KanjiVG, all then hand-curated entry by entry. More on that in how we curate Japanese vocabulary and about Moji.

If a vocab-first path sounds closer to what you want than a level ladder, the free tier is the whole comprehension path, so you can find out without paying anything: Moji is on the App Store.

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