KinhMõ
Read, understand, recite along
Only for iPhone
Free · Designed for iPhone. Not verified for macOS.
iPhone
The prayer book of the Linh Thứu pagoda in Berlin — line by line, with translation, pronunciation and the rhythm of recitation. Fully offline, no account, free.
KinhMõ is a learning app for the Vietnamese Buddhist prayer book of the Linh Thứu pagoda in Berlin, as it is read there at funeral and memorial services: you read the original text, fade translation and pronunciation in underneath it, and tap any word to look it up instantly — with no internet connection. On top of that come the beat of mõ, ding and bell for reciting along, short review rounds through the book's own words, and 35 short articles on what the book takes for granted.
READING AND TRACKS
The original Vietnamese text stays; misprints are corrected and recorded in the page notes. German, English and a simplified pronunciation settle in underneath it, line by line — or not at all. The reading view keeps the same page numbers and the same paragraphs as the printed book, so opening the real book at the temple lands you on the same place. In Recitation at the default font size, every printed line gets its own row. And to test yourself, Memorize covers every second, third, fourth or fifth word, or veils whole lines together with their tracks — a tap brings one back, and ending the mode leaves the page open as before. That is how you find out whether a page sticks without reading it.
LOOKUP
Tap a word: what it means in German or English (in both, with both translations shown), the Hán-Việt characters behind it where it has them — and a note of where the meaning came from. The dictionary ships with the app and is never fetched — with an entry for each of the book's roughly 1,100 words.
RECITATION
For the pages of the Sunday service, mõ and ding keep the beat and a bell closes the chant, at the tempo the temple speaks them. The text moves with the beat — you follow the rhythm instead of chasing the page.
REVIEW
A short round over words and lines from the book: tap, choose, arrange — never on a keyboard. It ends after a handful of questions, and tomorrow there is another.
FREQUENCY
All 48 pages have been counted. Every word in the book is ranked by how often it occurs, so what you meet most you learn first.
LEARN
35 short articles: who the figures in the prayers are, what the sections mean, how the ceremony runs and what kinds of text the book holds — sutra, verse, mantra and invocation.
EVERYTHING STAYS ON YOUR DEVICE
No account, no sign-in, no advertising, no analytics. The app makes no network request at all: the dictionary, the texts and your progress live on the iPhone. German and English, free.
ABOUT THE BOOK
The book is that pagoda's own compilation: traditional texts, chosen and arranged by that community. The translations are written for this app and, where a parallel edition exists, anchored to freely distributed editions; where a meaning rests on editorial judgement, the app says so in the dictionary.
Ratings & Reviews
- This app hasn’t received enough ratings or reviews to display an overview.
More accurate content, plus a few improvements:
• Learn articles checked and corrected
• Translations and page notes revised, names made consistent
• A few words in the Vietnamese text corrected and recorded in the page notes
• Hán-Việt characters only on words that really are Hán-Việt; many characters corrected
• Word type in Lookup shown in your language
• "Read more in Learn": the article opens cleanly, and Back takes you to where you were
• Vocabulary groups follow the status picker: New, Learning, Familiar, Known
• "Phonetic (Southern)": word endings as spoken in the South
• Settings previews show real text
• Review: questions and answers no longer give away the solution
The developer, Nick Zimmermann, indicated that the app’s privacy practices may include handling of data as described below. For more information, see the developer’s privacy policy .
Data Not Collected
The developer does not collect any data from this app.
Accessibility
The developer has not yet indicated which accessibility features this app supports. Learn More
Information
- Seller
- Nick Zimmermann
- Size
- 62.5 MB
- Category
- Education
- Compatibility
Requires iOS 15.1 or later.
- iPhone
Requires iOS 15.1 or later. - iPod touch
Requires iOS 15.1 or later. - Mac
Requires macOS 12.0 or later and a Mac with Apple M1 chip or later. - Apple Vision
Requires visionOS 1.0 or later.
- iPhone
- Languages
- English and German
- Age Rating
4+
- 4+
- Copyright
- © 2026 Nick Zimmermann