The Cheapest Way to Learn Japanese

It can be very expensive trying to learn Japanese.

‍I have spent thousands of dollars trying to learn this language. It doesn't help that every time I quit, lost motivation, didn't believe in myself--anytime I looked for clues about how to learn Japanese there was someone there to take my money.

‍Language schools. Private Lessons. Video series. Anime subscriptions. Books and books and books.

I guess anytime people want to do something really difficult, there's always a product there to comfort them into believing they can do it. Just think of how many ads you see about losing weight every day. Or getting rich.

Anyways, in retrospect, there are a lot of things I should have done differently, and a lot of things I'm doing differently now.

But let's imagine for just a bit that I'm going back in time and starting Japanese from zero all over again.

This is what my young, broke self would do...

*Well, I would actually just sign up for NativShark, as I think it's the most cost-effective option for reaching a very high level of proficiency, but I work there and am a co-founder, so I won't talk about it too much in this article.

The Cheapest Way to Learn Japanese

There are only three things you ever need to buy when studying a language:

1. Study Materials (NativShark, Books, Audio Lessons, etc.)
2. Study Tools (Smartphones, Tablets, Flashcard Apps)
3. Lessons

In this post, I'm going to list what I find to be cost-effective options for each of these three things."

Cost-Effective" is kind of a difficult word to define, because it has a subjective meaning. If you have lots of money, maybe there are some things that you might consider cost-effective that I wouldn't. So, for the purposes of this article, let's just say that:

cost-effective - (adj.) something that poor, 21-year old Niko (me) would have paid for back in the day

Okay. We've got our foundation set (very important when learning languages). Let's see what we've got...

1) Cost-Effective Study Materials

When I say 'study materials,' what I mean is anything that teaches you new Japanese words, grammar, kanji, etc.

A site (like NihongoShark, the one you're reading right now) which mostly talks about how to learn a language is not teaching you Japanese. It's much different than a site like NativShark, which focuses instead on teaching the language.

Warning: Before I start listing a bunch of books and audio lesson and whatnot that you want to go buy, please be careful about level-appropriate study materials.

One big mistake that I repeated (six hundred times) when studying Japanese was buying study materials way above my level.

‍How to read novels in Japanese? Sounds Awesome! But then I buy a book like that and realize that my vocabulary and kanji foundation... and grammar... and everything... is way too low for reading novels. In the time that I spent frying my brain trying to understand what I was looking at, I could have learned ten new kanji, words, practiced my listening skill, talked to someone!

But, meh, live and learn... Japanese.

Books and audio lessons I would still buy (if NativShark didn't exist):

‍Beginner Level

• Genki 1 + Workbook --> Genki 2 + Workbook --> Intermediate Japanese + Workbook OR Minna no Nihongo 1 + English Supplement --> Minna no Nihongo 2 + English Supplement.
  I have done all of the exercises in all of these books, as I've had quite a messy Japanese-studying adventure. If I went back in time, I would just buy one or the other and learn them like the back of my hand. Worldwide, Minna no Nihongo seems to be the more popularly used textbook. Either way, you should practice the grammar in whatever text you use with a teacher, tutor, friend, etc. Note that you will not learn how to speak naturally in casual situations from these books. Or from any books, really. And most apps. And sites.
• Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar. This is more of a reference book. You can get the entire 3-book series here.)
• Tae Kim's Japanese Grammar Guide is (1) totally free online and (2) has some awkward, non-native-sounding-language, but (3) people really like it.
• Pretty much everything on the Links page.

Intermediate Level (whatever that means)

• Dictionary of Intermediate Japanese Grammar. You might also want to pick up the Advanced Grammar book, but honestly I've never even read it. I did read some N1 and N2 JLPT Grammar books that were completely in Japanese, but I bought them in Japan and don't remember what they were called. Probably one of these ones though. The example sentences and practice examples were helpful. But I still think that there are easier ways to understand the nuances of advanced Japanese grammar.
• Making Sense of Japanese, by Jay Rubin. When I first read this book, my Japanese was still a pretty low level, and I didn't get much out of it. Then I read it again about six months later, and I thought it was helpful.

Advanced Level

• Uh... whatever you want? If you're at an advanced level, you can pick whatever you want and study that. Books, manga, whatever.
• The マンガで優しく分かる series of books are really helpful. They're 説明書, so they're not too hard to read. There are usually very clear (and sometimes monotonous) explanations, plus manga dialogues that emphasize key points. So far I've read a Japanese manga explanation of Neuro-Linguistic Programming and the Japanese manga version of The E-Myth: Revisited. Both were pretty enjoyable and straightforward. Via manga, you can also study The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Leadership,  NLP (1), NLP (2), Coaching, Logical Thinking, and Problem-Solving. I think maybe reading Manga Self-Help Books in Japanese might be the height of nerd-dom as we know it. It's amazing. I have officially reached max nerd-dom, everyone. Please don't tell my girlfriend.
• iBooks Samples. If you have an iPad and access to the Japanese iTunes Store, then you might want to think about looking at the iBooks Store (in Japanese, of course) and downloading free samples of books. Usually you get the first 30-50 pages for free. So, for example, my iPad has a ton of free samples of Japanese books on everything from Zen Buddhism to Tips on Sounding Intelligent. My rule is that I can't purchase a book unless I read the whole sample first. As expected, usually I get tired of books before I finish the sample.

2) Cost-Effective Study Tools

These ones are optional. But I'd still buy them.

• Anki is actually free. And usually I like to use the (free) desktop version when adding new cards. Still, I think the (comparatively expensive) app is really awesome. Technically, it's not absolutely necessary, because you can use AnkiWeb to study your cards on your phone without it. But I have spent thousands of hours using this app. So I'm pretty happy to pay for it. Update: SRS programs like Anki have their uses, but most people rely on them too much, which tends to lead to both burnout and just despising your daily study routine. There are better ways.
• An iPad or tablet will set you back kind of a lot. But I use my iPad so much when reading Japanese texts. Also, I use it for studying Anki cards, watching Japanese movies and shows, ebooks etc. And even when I'm at work or on the train or in a coffee shop, I use it to write articles.
• Smartphones are the best for studying languages. I wish we had Google Lens back when I was learning Japanese.

If you know any other boss ninja tools, please tell me in the comments.

3) Cost-Effective Lessons

99% of my Japanese ability was built through self-study, not through lessons with teachers. But there is one downside to self-study, though: it's easy to overlook your shortcomings. Sometimes I meet a foreigner here in Japan who majored in Japanese, studied about for one or two years at a Japanese language school in Japan--in short, someone who has had between 5-10 times as many hours as me in a Japanese classroom. Even though my Japanese is often better, I can't help but respect how clean their Japanese is. Nice, beautiful 丁寧な日本語. And at such times, I wonder if perhaps I should have spent some more time in a Japanese classroom.

But hey, I planned to spend more time in a Japanese classroom. I just couldn't afford it. In those six months that I was studying in Tokyo, I burned through all of my savings and ended up heading back to California feeling defeated and discouraged. That was the first time I gave up on studying Japanese, because I thought maybe it was just impossible. I couldn't afford to study it. I know now that I was just making excuses. But those excuses cost me more than a year of no studying whatsoever.

‍If I could go back, I wouldn't study at a Japanese school in Tokyo, though. Instead, I would either stay in my home country and take lessons online, or (more likely) I would take Japanese classes somewhere they're cheaper than Japan.

‍Cost-Effective Lessons:

• italki is a website that connects language teachers with students, and it already has well over a million users. Usually, teachers are not too expensive, and many of them appear to be quite experienced. Maybe you won't be in a foreign country, but maybe that also means that you can save a lot of money, which means you have more money for lessons, which means you get better at Japanese. You can often find lessons from native Japanese tutors on italki for under $10.
• Japanese Schools in cheap countries are an option that I only began to consider recently. I'm planning to move to Thailand in a few months, and I was researching Thai language schools in Bangkok and Chiang Mai when I found out that a lot of the schools also have Japanese courses. And usually one group lesson is only $5 US or less! What?! And theoretically there should be even cheaper options in Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos, etc. I'm planning to look up more schools around Southeast Asia, but theoretically they should be available in countries across the globe. In retrospect, I could have spent less money studying at a Japanese language school in Southeast Asia for two years than I spent studying at a school in Tokyo for six months. I'd like to make a list of cheap schools around the world available for readers. So if you know of one, please message me. Saigon Language School in Vietnam, for example, is only about $100 (at the time of writing) for 2 months of classes 3 times a week. Nice!
• Language Exchange is another option, but technically these aren't lessons. There is a large number of Japanese people using MyLanguageExchange.com, Lang-8, and LiveMocha. So you shouldn't have any trouble finding an exchange partner. Everyone wants to learn English, after all. Most of these options are free or very cheap.

What cheap lesson options am I forgetting? Please let me know!

And if you're serious enough, maybe just pay for something? Maybe a tool that saves so much time and headache, it saves you money in the long run? Maybe NativShark? ^_^