NihonGO Manabi: Textbook
Intermediate Japanese: N3 & N2
Free · Designed for iPad. Not verified for macOS.
Free and complete: two intermediate textbooks in one app. Twenty-four chapters of one story, every N3 and N2 grammar pattern, 501 kanji, a live card behind every word.
NihonGO Manabi is the intermediate Japanese textbook: the book that gets you over the hardest wall in the language, from a finished beginner course to reading real Japanese.
Beginner textbooks are everywhere; intermediate ones are rare, and a complete free one did not exist. This is it. Two full books are in the app today, 学び I and 学び II, and the third is on its way as a free update.
ONE CONTINUING STORY
Follow a young reporter through her first two years on the job: twenty-four chapters of authentic native Japanese. Year one at a small newspaper in Kamakura, year two at a national daily in Tokyo. In every chapter, the first text is her reporting, the second the article she files. Furigana is one tap away, and an English line sits under every sentence on a switch you control.
EVERY WORD IS A LIVE CARD
Tap any underlined word and its card opens: meaning, reading, the kanji it is built from, an example sentence you can hear. Conjugated forms find their own dictionary form, so 歩いていた and 遅れたら open just like anything else.
WHAT THE TWO BOOKS TEACH
· Grammar: 194 N3 patterns in Book I and 175 more in Book II, which finishes N3 and covers every N2 pattern. Taught as families rather than scattered points, so you learn which one to reach for.
· Kanji: 254 N3 kanji in Book I, 247 in Book II, which completes the N3 set and opens N2. Each is introduced by the chapter that needs it and can be written by hand.
· Words: about 1,580 new words across the two books, most useful first, each one a card.
Each book opens with a plain statement of what you will have learned and where that leaves you for the JLPT.
SIX ROOMS IN EVERY CHAPTER
① an overview · ② the words you are about to meet, as tappable tiles · ③ the text, with audio · ④ the grammar behind it, in contrast tables · ⑤ a workbook where you write the Japanese yourself · ⑥ the chapter's kanji, written by hand.
A WORKBOOK THAT ASKS YOU TO WRITE
4,299 exercises across the twenty-four chapters. You write the sentence, then see how it should have been written. Free, as often as you like.
HANDWRITING, CORRECTED STROKE BY STROKE
Write a kanji with your finger or an Apple Pencil and it is checked for shape, stroke order, direction and missing strokes, and you are told which part went wrong. Entirely on your device.
IT COMES BACK
A word or kanji you keep peeking at, a grammar pattern you keep getting wrong: all of it returns in a spaced review queue that schedules itself, and the writing pad keeps its own list of the kanji you miss.
AN APPENDIX THAT IS ACTUALLY USEFUL
Reference tables for conjugation, a grammar index from N5 to N1, counters, keigo, transitive pairs, kana and radicals; printable word and kanji indexes for each book; and a dictionary with three scopes: this book, every card in the system, and a full Japanese–English dictionary of 218,000 entries.
ONE CARD REPOSITORY, THREE APPS
The cards come from the repository that also powers NihonGO Dominos (the drill) and NihonGO Dokusho (the reader). Each app carries its own selection, but a card is the same card wherever it appears.
BUILT FOR iPHONE AND iPAD
On an iPhone it goes everywhere and the writing pad works with a finger; on an iPad, text, cards and contents sit side by side and a Pencil turns the pad into a desk. Also on Apple silicon Macs, better for reading than writing.
WORKS COMPLETELY OFFLINE
Every chapter, card and audio clip is on your device the moment you install it. Both books work with no connection at all.
COMPLETELY FREE
No price, no in-app purchases, no ads, no account, no tracking. Book III arrives as a free update. Your progress stays on your device and follows you to your other devices through your own private iCloud.
OPTIONAL: YOUR OWN AI TUTOR
Connect your own Anthropic account and the workbook will mark what you wrote, explain why, and repair it into natural Japanese. Entirely optional, needs an internet connection, and clearly marked wherever it costs anything. Everything else works without it.
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The developer, JUERGEN WOLFGANG HAMMER, 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.
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Information
- Seller
- JUERGEN WOLFGANG HAMMER
- Size
- 1.4 GB
- Category
- Education
- Compatibility
Requires iOS 15.0 or later.
- iPhone
Requires iOS 15.0 or later. - iPad
Requires iPadOS 15.0 or later. - iPod touch
Requires iOS 15.0 or later. - Mac
Requires macOS 26.0 or later and a Mac with Apple M1 chip or later.
- iPhone
- Languages
- English
- Age Rating
4+
- 4+
- Copyright
- © 2026 Juergen Wolfgang Hammer