Slowly but surely services like Wikipedia and online dictionaries are replacing their traditional paper equivalents. (especially among us young folk) Recently these kinds of services have made their way into our pockets. I want to introduce you to a few of my favorite applications for Japanese study on the iPhone.
The first of these is simply called Japanese and is developed by codefromtokyo. In my opinion, Japanese is the most comprehensive, useful dictionary available. The most important feature for me is that the dictionary is available offline. Some of the other dictionaries only work while connected to the internet. I spent a full year studying Japanese in Japan using no other dictionary but this one. The only downside is that it isn’t free, and it isn’t cheap. Japanese is $19.99 on the iTunes Store, but, in my opinion, it is worth every penny.
For those of you who can’t afford a $20 iPhone/iPod Touch app, don’t worry. There are always free alternatives. My second recommendation is an alternative to Japanese. It is called wwwJDic and is developed by Concordia Seminary. I don’t use it much, but I do occasionally when I can’t find an entry with Japanese. A search with this app has very rarely returned zero results. The only limitation is that wwwJDic does not work when offline.
My final recommendation (for now), is an application I have just recently purchased. It’s called iKanji Touch and is developed by ThinkMac Software. This application is an impressive kanji study tool. iKanji Touch has over 2000 kanji grouped by school grades and by JLPT (Japanese Language Proficiency Test) level. According to the developers the algorithm used in ‘Teach Me’ mode is very effective for memorization. I haven’t had a chance to use it much yet, but I look forward to making this app a part of my daily routine. iKanji Touch is $9.99.
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