Toku Reader - 読
Japanese & Chinese Tap-to-Read
Only for iPhone
Free · In‑App Purchases
Tap any Japanese or Chinese word — instantly see how to read it and what it means. Across web, camera, video, and podcasts. Private, offline, beautifully fast.
Paste any Japanese or Chinese text and start reading instantly. Furigana, pinyin, tap-to-define, conjugation breakdowns — all offline.
Read, watch, and listen anywhere the language lives:
• Paste or import texts, PDFs, and multi-chapter EPUBs
• Browse real websites with readings added to the page — with tabs, history, and a distraction-free reading view
• Watch videos with interactive subtitles — search, tap, and read along line by line
• Listen to podcasts with a tappable, word-by-word transcript — follow shows, download episodes, and practice shadowing
Tap any word for its meaning, readings, animated stroke order, and radical breakdown. Tap the next word and the next — lookups flow as fast as you read.
A full dictionary tab with handwriting input, English reverse search, and side-by-side Simplified/Traditional Chinese. Save words to a built-in spaced-repetition review deck, or import your existing Anki deck and keep your scheduling history intact.
Connect your WaniKani account to study radicals, kanji, and vocabulary directly in the app — your SRS progress stays in sync, and known kanji light up inline as you read.
Reading, watching, and listening are free. The free plan includes 50 word lookups a day; upgrade anytime for unlimited.
The core experience works offline: tokenization, dictionaries, OCR, and reviews all run on-device. Your reading stays on your device.
Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
more This is a well thought out, beautiful app, which will definitely receive a lot of use by me. If I were to make a recommendation, I think it would be beneficial to be able to view pitch accent upon click of the individual words (Japanese). Other than that, great app. Thank you! <3
This is a well thought out, beautiful app, which will definitely receive a lot of use by me. If I were to make a recommendation, I think it would be beneficial to be able to view pitch accent upon click of the individual words (Japanese). Other than that, great app. Thank you! <3
• Sharper Japanese and Chinese reading accuracy.
• A more polished, responsive feel — subtle haptic feedback when you save words, bookmark, and turn pages, plus smoother loading throughout.
• Improved accessibility: animations now respect your "Reduce Motion" setting.
• Clearer feedback when something goes wrong, with a one-tap, fully anonymous way to send a crash report so we can fix bugs faster.
• A slimmer, faster download.
5.0.3 Jun 23
Version 5.0.2 is a stability update to 5.0.1, fixing a few issues some readers ran into:
• Fixed a freeze that could happen when rotating a video or podcast to landscape.
• More dependable importing — EPUB, PDF, subtitle, and dictionary files now handle a much wider range of formats and text encodings.
• Sturdier text handling, so words no longer occasionally go missing on unusual or copied-in text.
• Faster analysis of long passages.
• A range of smaller reading, watching, and listening refinements.
Thank you for reading with Toku. If you run into anything, reach us from the in-app support link.
5.0.2 Jun 16
Now you can listen, too.
PODCASTS — a whole new way to study
• Search and follow 100+ Japanese and Chinese shows, download episodes, and read along with a tappable transcript — tap any word for its meaning, line by line.
• Shadowing practice: focus one sentence, auto-pause, replay, and slow it down to speak along.
• Listening comforts: background play, a persistent mini-player, sleep timer, skip silence, chapters, and a downloads manager.
• Your Library: follow shows, line up what's next, and keep a unified history across video and podcasts.
READING IS FREE
Reading, watching, and listening are now free and unmetered. On the free plan you can tap up to 50 words a day for their meaning — upgrade anytime for unlimited.
ALSO NEW
• A faster start: a redesigned welcome, and a one-tap "Read from Clipboard" that reads anything you've copied instantly (nothing is saved unless you choose to keep it).
• Curated starter sites on the Browse tab, with a Japanese/Chinese filter.
• Pick a translation language for video subtitles, drawn from the video's own captions.
• Traditional Chinese improvements, plus many stability and reliability fixes.
Thanks for reading — and now listening — with Toku.
5.0.1 Jun 16
Toku Reader 5.0 is the biggest update yet — a complete reading companion across text, web, photos, and now video.
NEW — Watch tab: search for a video, tap it, and read along with interactive subtitles. Every line gets furigana or pinyin, the current line follows playback, and any word is one tap from its meaning.
A real browser: tabs, history, and a clean reading view for articles — with readings annotated right on the page.
Faster lookups: tap word after word without closing the card, and see animated stroke order and radical breakdowns right in the popup.
Smarter Chinese: when characters can be grouped more than one way, the word card shows the alternatives — tap to switch.
Plus a cleaner five-tab layout (Read · Watch · Browse · Words · Dictionary) and many fixes and performance improvements.
5.0 Jun 12
• Sign in with Apple — completely optional. Toku stays fully usable without an account, and you can remove your account anytime from Settings.
• Animated stroke order — tap any kanji or hanzi, open its character detail, and watch exactly how it's written, stroke by stroke.
• Import multi-chapter EPUBs as books, with per-chapter progress so you always pick up where you left off.
• A new page scrubber for flipping through long texts in a flash.
• A smoother, more reliable Web Reader — tap-to-define now follows the word as you scroll.
• Faster, more accurate readings, stability fixes, and safer handling of your data behind the scenes.
Happy reading!
4.5.8 Jun 9
Toku Reader 4.5.6 adds stroke order, long-book reading, an optional account, and a more dependable web reader — plus the usual deep pass on reading accuracy.
Stroke order: tap into a character to watch how it's written, stroke by stroke, with a moving brush head. Play, pause, step, loop, and adjust speed. Japanese kanji and Chinese hanzi both render with correct, filled strokes.
Read long books: import a multi-chapter EPUB and it now arrives as a single book, grouped by chapter. Each chapter opens fast and remembers your place, and your overall progress is tracked across the whole book.
Faster navigation in long texts: a new page scrubber lets you drag to jump anywhere in a piece, with a live page indicator. The reader controls now sit clear of the home indicator.
Optional account: sign in with Apple to secure your account — it's entirely optional. Everything works without one, and your reading library, saved words, and progress live on your device either way. You can sign out or delete your account at any time, and export a full backup of your data as a file.
A more dependable Web Reader: annotation is more reliable across sites and single-page apps, the word popup now follows the word as you scroll instead of disappearing, and tap-to-define keeps working even on pages that load slowly.
Reading accuracy: a large round of Japanese and Chinese corrections to readings, word boundaries, and meanings — drawn from real corpora of literature and journalism.
Stability and your data: fixed a rare launch issue, and made data updates safer — if anything goes wrong while updating your library, the app now keeps a safety backup automatically instead of starting fresh.
Plus many smaller polish items across the dictionary, reader, and settings.
4.5.6 Jun 1
Toku Reader 4.5.5 polishes the popup, deepens the library, and quietly improves how it reads almost every text.
Dictionary popup: see every matching dictionary entry, not just the first. Entries are ranked by frequency so the reading you actually want is on top. Multi-word expressions surface ahead of their parts, and the layout has been tightened for legibility.
Continue reading, anywhere: the app now remembers where you left off across every reading surface — pasted text, web pages, OCR scans, and library works — and shows a subtle cue when you come back. You can also mark a piece as finished by hand.
A larger Japanese library: many new classic short stories and essays have been added.
Web Reader: more reliable tap behavior on Japanese and Chinese pages — tapping a character no longer accidentally follows links.
OCR: when you save text scanned from a photo, the position you tapped is preserved so you can pick up exactly where you were.
PDF imports: the layout engine handles vertical (tategaki) text more reliably, with better column ordering and furigana filtering.
Tokenization accuracy: hundreds of small fixes to readings and word boundaries, drawn from real corpora of Japanese and Chinese literature.
Library capacity raised: you can now keep up to 100 texts, with up to 100,000 characters per text.
Plus dozens of smaller polish items across the dictionary, reader, and settings.
4.5.5 May 26
Pick up exactly where you left off. The reader now tracks your reading more carefully — a subtle marker shows where you stopped, and reopening a text returns to the precise token, not just the page. The same continuity works across the paste reader, web reader, and OCR.
The reading library has a new home. A Home / Library segmented control replaces the older browser. Home surfaces a Continue Reading rail and recommended works; Library adds a search bar and filter chips for language, collection, author, era, level, and sort — making it easy to find something to read at the right difficulty.
Dozens of new short stories, fables, and poems added — early-20th-century Japanese literary works alongside classical Chinese poetry and prose. All bundled offline.
Behind the scenes: thousands more dictionary entries covering verb-form variants and uncommon spellings. Sharper word boundaries in pre-war and literary text. Several hundred previously-empty word definitions across the bundled library are now populated.
Other improvements:
- Pasted text limit raised to 100 saved texts and 100,000 characters per text.
- Web reader: taps near images, decorative spans, and mixed-script runs now reliably land on the nearest real word.
- OCR: tapping a word and saving the photo to your library carries that tap as the resume anchor.
Everything still runs offline. Your reading stays on your device.
4.5.4 May 21
Improved reading accuracy across Japanese and Chinese texts — especially pre-war and classical literature, long-form non-fiction, and modern serialized fiction. More words are now segmented and pronounced correctly on the first read, with fewer manual lookups needed.
Everything still runs offline. Behavior, permissions, and your saved data are unchanged.
4.5.3 May 12
Maintenance + accuracy update.
ENGINE READINGS — 29 IMPROVEMENT SESSIONS
Japanese (15 fixes): Better tokenization in literary prose, news articles, and Aozora classics. More accurate readings for proper names, conjugation chains, and katakana compound nouns. Specific articles triaged this release: Asahi (磐越道バス事故, ADHD procrastination), NHK (憲法施行79年), Akita Ujaku (三人の百姓), 歳月の門 Edo merchant series, 奥日光・神猿, 狐の嫁入り 第41-84話, てくてく日本語 podcast batch.
Chinese (14 fixes): Classical narrative (三國演義 chapters 21-23), more accurate Tang poetry (李白, 杜甫, 白居易, 王維, 孟浩然, 王之渙), and modern news clusters. Polyphone disambiguation for context-sensitive characters. Better sandhi handling within compounds. Specific articles triaged this release: BBC Chinese (FIFA-CCTV broadcast, Iran Lego-AI, AI-brain feature), 轉角國際 (長崎蛋糕之妻), UDN (洋妾花終焉怪談), BBC Anta sportswear, 三國演義 ch.21-23.
READ-ALONG AUDIO
TTS now skips punctuation tokens during read-along, so spoken pauses sound natural — no more reading 「 」 as literal characters.
REGRESSION NET
Every engine fix in this release was verified against a curated corpus of 29 articles spanning Tang poetry, Bashō haiku, Showa novels, modern news, Three Kingdoms classical narrative, and Taiwan tabloids — ensuring nothing previously correct got worse.
WHAT DID NOT CHANGE
- No new permissions, background modes, or third-party SDKs
- All reading data still stays on your device — no analytics, no sync
- Same OTA delivery, same in-app purchases, same UI
Thank you for using Toku Reader. If you spot a wrong reading on a token, please send feedback through Settings — every report makes the engine smarter.
4.5.2 May 11
v4.5.1 — Reading quality + content updates
• Engine accuracy: dozens of small triage fixes across the Japanese and Chinese readers — better proper-noun handling, cleaner katakana long-vowel readings, smarter polyphone resolution, tighter idiom/counter merges, and improved POS classification for function words.
• Pull-to-refresh on the Read tab, plus a "Refresh content library" button in Settings — manually fetch the latest curated works on demand instead of waiting for the daily auto-refresh.
• Content library additions: Three Kingdoms (三國演義) chapter 2, 白居易《問劉十九》, and editorial polish across existing works.
Thanks for reading.
4.5.1 May 6
A curated reading library, all-new in this update.
NEW — CONTENT LIBRARY
Browse hand-edited classic works with line-by-line English translations, footnotes, and inline cross-references. Tap any character for the same instant dictionary you get on your own pasted text — but with editorial glosses on top.
Launching with:
• Japanese: Bashō (古池や / 閑さや), Issa (雀の子), Akutagawa (蜘蛛の糸 / 杜子春), Miyazawa (やまなし / 注文の多い料理店), Niimi Nankichi (ごん狐 / 手袋を買いに), Ogawa Mimei (赤いろうそくと人魚)
• Chinese: Tang quartet (Li Bai 靜夜思, Wang Wei 鹿柴 / 鳥鳴澗, Du Fu 春望 / 絕句, Wang Zhihuan 登鸛雀樓, Meng Haoran 春曉, Bai Juyi 問劉十九), Han Yu 師說, and the opening chapter of 三國演義
A single "Read" tab now hosts both your imports and the Content library. New works arrive over-the-air — no app update needed.
NEW — INLINE EDITORIAL APPARATUS
Where the editor flagged a phrase, you'll see a small ※ for a footnote, an EN chip for a translation bubble, or a ↗ arrow that jumps you straight to the work it references. Toggle them off any time if you want a clean read.
ENGINE
Twenty-plus Mandarin segmentation and tone fixes triaged from real-world news pages — proper-noun pinyin title-casing, 會面 / 面臨 split, country-abbreviation handling, 中 / 以 / 為 polyphones, and 和美 / 三星 / 和數 disambiguation. Japanese engine adds yamanashi-class onomatopoeia (クラムボン, かぷかぷ) and fox-story compound nouns to the user dictionary.
POLISH
• Reading position is preserved when a Content work updates mid-read
• "Seen in Content" row in the dictionary surfaces every place a word appears in the library
• Words tab gains a Source filter (Reader / Content / Imported)
• Dynamic Type support tightened across reader popups
• Several deprecation and stability cleanups ahead of iOS 18
Everything still runs offline — tokenization, dictionaries, OCR, SRS, and now the Content library too.
4.5 May 5
v4.4 — Sharper readings, smoother browsing.
Japanese engine
• Native readings for 1人 / 2人 (ひとり / ふたり) and a full counter audit pass
• NHK news headline accuracy: 大統領, 錦織圭, 高まる, 年越え and dozens more
• Better handling of 行く forms, common compounds, and onomatopoeia definitions
• New pipeline-level regression coverage for device-log feedback
Chinese engine
• New Wikidata-backed proper-noun pack: countries, capitals, Greek and Roman deities, Western historical figures, and Taiwan politicians now segment and define correctly
• Smarter Traditional / Simplified mixed-script handling for tokens like 担憂, 脱鉤, 現状
• Optimal-segmentation rewrite eliminates over-merge regressions on long Taiwan literary passages
• Numbers and punctuation: cleaner segmentation, English glosses for digits, tone-marked pinyin preserved
• Closed out the 為 passive-marker compound family and several non-CEDICT four-character expressions
Web Reader
• NHK ONE, BBC, NYT and other single-page article sites: furigana and pinyin now persist across in-page navigation.
• Page language detection is now per-block: mixed Japanese / English / Chinese pages annotate every block correctly
• Reading Aid (Off / Primary / Furigana / Pinyin) survives single-page-app route changes; no more silent reverts to Off
Popup
• Taps now open directly into the expanded word card — no compact-tier flash, snappier feel
• Cross-token taps animate cleanly; the card never covers the tapped word
OCR Reader
• Language picker now honors your choice end-to-end, not just at the recognizer
• Selection persists across sessions
• Old-form kanji (旧字体) and IVS variants handled correctly in tokenization
Stability and polish
• Numerous device-log feedback fixes across both engines
• Documentation and architecture refresh for v4.4
No new permissions. No new background modes. Everything still runs offline on your device.
4.4 May 1
Traditional Chinese:
- Shinjitai fold layer improves tokenization and dictionary hits on Traditional-only and mixed-script text.
- IVS / surrogate-pair handling fixed (emoji, variation selectors no longer break tap targets).
Reading Aid:
- New 4-state Reading Aid picker (Off / Primary / Furigana / Pinyin) on every reader + Settings.
- Pinyin sandhi-display toggle for learners who want to see the underlying tones.
OCR:
- Rebuilt on Google ML Kit (on-device). More accurate on photographed print.
- Language-override picker if auto-detect picks the wrong script.
Web Reader:
- Ruby/pinyin/furigana now render reliably across news sites and any page background.
- Headlines (H1-H3) are annotated.
WaniKani:
- Image-only radicals render correctly (one-time re-sync on first launch).
- Kana converter, English-shake detection, mined-word tap polish.
Chinese engine:
- 20 high-confidence polyphone fixes (surname vs. common-word).
- Country-pair anchors, modern defaults for 於 / 讀 / 读 / 南.
4.3 Apr 25
v4.2 adds Taiwan Traditional Chinese, richer WaniKani reviews, and a more robust web reader.
• Taiwan's MoEDict (教育部重編國語辭典) is bundled. Dictionary tab shows Simplified/Traditional in parallel with your preferred script primary, backed by both CC-CEDICT and MoEDict side by side.
• WaniKani wrong-answer reveal now shows similar-kanji component diff, pitch accent on vocab, and cross-references to words from your own reading history. Reviews respect silent mode, support opt-in auto-advance, and the kana input field is rock-solid under live typing.
• Anki Export: export your saved vocabulary as TSV, CSV, or JSON with stable deterministic GUIDs so re-importing never creates duplicates.
• Web Reader: manual language override per page, always-visible annotation menu, expression highlighting matching the text reader, reliable on chrome-heavy sites like NYT Chinese.
• Chinese engine: 9 polyphone expansion batches, context-aware CEDICT lookup that eliminates cross-reference polyphone mismatches, shared CJK numeral parser, fixes for 2小时, 3点30分, and other common time expressions.
• OCR: furigana classifier + ruby pairer for vertical Japanese, Google ML Kit as a selectable alternate engine, line-level tap fallback, manual text entry escape hatch when recognition is poor.
• Refreshed Settings layout, first-run onboarding for the Words tab, handwriting model prewarmer.
Everything still runs offline — tokenization, dictionaries, OCR, and reviews are all on-device.
4.2 Apr 22
WaniKani integration — Connect your WaniKani account to do reviews and lessons in Toku Reader, see kanji highlighted in your reading, and get mnemonics in the word popup.
Complete Anki import — Import .apkg files with full scheduling history, tags, deck structure, and extra fields preserved. Filter the word library by deck or tag, and scope review sessions to a specific imported deck.
Export to Anki — Export your saved vocabulary as .apkg, .tsv, .csv, or .json with stable IDs so re-importing into Anki never creates duplicates.
OCR Reader overhaul — Sharper character boxes, Google ML Kit as an alternative engine, cleaner handling of furigana, and a manual-entry fallback if recognition misses.
Web Reader reliability — More consistent tap-to-read across sites, better language detection, fewer silent errors.
4.1 Apr 21
Toku Reader is now a complete reading companion:
• Chinese support with pinyin, HSK levels, and Simplified/Traditional parity
• Built-in JMDict and CC-CEDICT dictionaries with handwriting input and English reverse lookup
• Spaced repetition review system (FSRS-5) with multiple review modes
• Import words from CSV, TSV, and Anki decks
• Web Reader, OCR Reader for printed text, PDF and EPUB support
• Share Sheet integration to import text from any app
• Premium subscription for unlimited analysis
4.0 Apr 17
Web Reader
• Smart URL bar: type a search or paste a URL — it auto-detects which you mean
• Scroll-driven browser chrome: address bar and controls slide away as you read, giving you a full-screen experience
• Tab bar stays visible while browsing
Study
• Simplified 2-button review grading (Forgot / Remembered) for faster SRS sessions
• Review cards show predicted next-review intervals before you answer
Word Popup
• Script variant display: see Traditional Chinese, Simplified Chinese, or Old-form Kanji for any word
• Cleaner popup layout with improved spacing and readability
Premium
• Monthly subscription unlocks unlimited text analysis across all reading surfaces
• Free tier includes a monthly analysis allowance to try the app before subscribing
3.1 Apr 16
Toku Reader 3.0 — Major Update
NEW: Chinese Language Support
- Full Mandarin analysis with pinyin readings, tone sandhi, and HSK levels
- Traditional Chinese character display
- 300+ golden tests for accuracy
NEW: OCR Reader
- Photograph printed text with your camera or select from Photos
- Instant readings and tap-to-lookup on recognized text
- Supports vertical (tategaki) Japanese and Chinese layouts
NEW: Web Reader
- Built-in browser for reading Japanese and Chinese web pages
- Tap any word for instant dictionary lookup
- Favorites and recent pages
NEW: Share Extension
- Share text from Safari, Notes, or any app directly into Toku Reader
NEW: Spaced Repetition (SRS)
- FSRS-5 algorithm with 4-button grading
- Daily review dashboard with streaks and progress tracking
- Practice mode for extra study
NEW: Import
- Anki deck import (.apkg) with scheduling state
- CSV/TSV word list import
- EPUB and PDF import with vertical text support
Improvements
- Expanding word cards with instant tap response
- Guided quick tour for new users
- Hundreds of parser accuracy improvements for both languages
3.0 Apr 9
Chinese (Mandarin) support is here.
Paste any Chinese text and Toku Reader will show pinyin readings above every character. Tap any word to see its meaning, HSK level, and traditional character form.
The Chinese engine handles tone sandhi, polyphonic characters, and common compound expressions. Three sample Chinese texts (HSK 1–3) are included to get you started.
2.0 Apr 6
- Smarter parsing: compound verbs, grammar patterns, and 11 user-reported fixes
- Conjugated verbs now show context-aware meanings (e.g., 食べなかった → "didn't eat")
- Idiom and expression detection for 13,200+ multi-word phrases
- Improved date and counter readings
- Redesigned word popup
- Bug fixes and accuracy improvements
1.2.1 Apr 2
• Sharper Japanese and Chinese reading accuracy.
• A more polished, responsive feel — subtle haptic feedback when you save words, bookmark, and turn pages, plus smoother loading throughout.
• Improved accessibility: animations now respect your "Reduce Motion" setting.
• Clearer feedback when something goes wrong, with a one-tap, fully anonymous way to send a crash report so we can fix bugs faster.
• A slimmer, faster download.
more Version 5.0.3 Jun 23
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