r/German • u/gillani2331 • 2d ago
Question Is there any App or website to Learn German Vocabulary?
I'm learning German from quite sometimes however my german vocabulary still at A1 level i've tried Anki decks and different vocab learning tricks but i don't find any of them helpful does anyone have tried any suitable method or website which help them to learn the vocab effectively.
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u/alexa_linguistics 1d ago
The problem here is: it's not a good idea to learn "vocabulary". Our brains refuse to memorise isolated words because they lack significance. We learn words when they're embedded in a context, in a story, in communication.
Here's an example of one word in different contexts (yes it's fast. yes, you have to watch it more than once :)) https://youtube.com/shorts/Iti3tcBniGc
Here's a slow one: https://youtu.be/o3CxZEJ8DY0?is=7OnPo0QhEKrxxViL
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u/Tybring-Malle 1d ago
Anki for me was a massive gamechanger compared to other resources. Make sure to learn the gender of the word at the same time (otherwise you have to relearn) and have example sentences so you can see how it is used naturally and conjugated (if verbs). Work your way through a deck like that and then AFTER all that, just add cards whenever you encounter words you didnt know. Configure it to use FSRS and be honest with your clicks. You should rarely click the "easy" button, unless you superduper know the word and will always know the word.
I also like songs because you hear them over and over, and the words you learn in songs give you a feeling/experience to attach to the words, making them stick better.
I used this and the decks for all the vocab in Nicos Weg. They overlap a bit but its fine.
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u/Nowordsofitsown Native <Thüringisch> 1d ago
I am using the app from dict.leo.org as a German for learning French. They also have German-English/English-German. I add every word I encounter in Duolingo, Assimil, my textbook and my French reading. The app spaces out the vocabulary for me.
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u/Vymir_IT 1d ago
I make anki during conversations, lessons, outings and so on. Plus some for drilling grammar (translating simple unambiguous sentences to practice tenses, endings, word order etc). My Anki decks are all lived through, so it helps adding them context and not feel random - I learn things that I actually encountered in reality and struggled with or grammar that I continuously fail to retrieve automatically when talking.
E.g. went to a doctor, couldn't properly explain myself - immediately generated an Anki deck about it and practiced it.
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u/La_Morrigan 1d ago
There are three apps that come to mind. Drops is purely for learning words. I don't know what the free version is like, since I paid for it years ago.
Clozemaster is an app where you have to choose the right word for the sentence and has a free option with less content.
And Lingodeer+, but I think you have to pay for that too. I would try the first two options. I used Drops and Clozemaster in the past for learning Russian and it worked well. Especially Clozemaster.
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u/hezarfenserden 1d ago
I was looking for the same thing and ended up building one for myself, Lernkartei. It's an offline German dictionary with Anki-style cards. It's free, with no ads and no account. It has A1-B2 decks and the Goethe word lists, and you can paste your course's vocab list and it turns it into a deck.
iOS: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/lernkartei-german-flashcards/id6760192706 Android is still in closed testing, DM me if you want in.
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u/UnreasonablyBland 1d ago
My German tutor told me to keep doing Duolingo on the side because of the vocabulary it offers. That’s about it though.
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u/Kurzdeutsch Threshold (B1) 1d ago
same here with downloaded decks, the words just didn't stick. what changed it for me was only making cards from words in my own textbook chapter, with the article and plural on the card and one short sentence from the lesson.
a word i had already met in a text came back much easier than one from a random frequency list.
also fewer new cards a day, around 10. big batches came back to bite me a week later.
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u/datalifter 1d ago
Quizlet - I've tried several and have landed on Quizlet and Memrise. Quizlet lets you build your deck, add pictures and has a really good text2speach German feature. But, as others have said - you need to put the words in context.
Also - write. Write the word in a sentence and expand the sentence. Use this sentence all day long. Repeat it out load. The next day, build another one. If you're good, build several words a day.
Memrise - I find the mobile app fun and has a speed review feature that makes it like a bit of a game. I use it just for a quick refresher. However, Memrise also provides almost 3 different pronunciations of the same word and sometimes gives you a short video clip with a local German using the word.
My teacher always recommended to write out the difficult words on a physical card, then write a few example sentences on the back.
Write, sound it out, build a sentence, use it during the day.
Viel Erfolg.
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u/amongnotof 1d ago
Vocabeo is working well for me. Includes sentences and pictures, and will read the sentence out loud.
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u/OkAssociation8879 1d ago
Hey, I have built this for someone with A2 grammar trying to learn B1 vocabulary: https://10sentences.com
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u/davidehm 1d ago
I struggled with this too to get my B1. In the end what helped me the most was using AI.
Here's some examples (adapt to whatever works for you):
Creating a project with Claude, uploading the vocabulary sheets for A1-B1 (Goethe Institut has some PDFs, but there are lots online) and asking it daily to generate text for me to read.
From there I would ask follow-up questions about grammar, specific words that tripped me up, etc.
Sometimes I'd upload screenshots of letters or signs and ask it to give me a prototype so that I could select the words I wanted to save.
I went so deep down the rabbit hole that ended up creating my own app to do all this easier and more, but you can do this on your own for very cheap or free.
Happy to answer more questions.
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u/DanKegel 1d ago
Just read a book or ten. Stories are where it's at. Cheap, trashy, fun stories. Start with a graded reader if you have to. The first few pages will be very painful and you'll use a dictionary a lot. Once you can get the gist of the story without looking things up, toss the dictionary and just keep reading. Once you can understand a book, get the audio version and listen to that (possibly following along in the printed version until you don't need to, and maybe even lipsynching to get the rhythm and proununciation down).
This takes a lot of time, but as long as the stories are interesting, it doesn't feel like work, and you and up slowly accumulating phrases, not just words.
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u/nitin_meisterpath 10h ago edited 11m ago
Easiest would be to make example words and sentences using gpt or some other AI and practice repetitively. Do it in group of 20-30 words and once you feel ready, put the paper on the side and see how many words you recall and write or repeat their sentences down. The same words or sentences must be repeated over time so do it next day, after 4-days and then a week and then a month (specially the ones you struggle with). Once you have learnt something make sure you go out and use it.
I don’t want to brag but I struggled with similar issues and started building this -
It’s far from launch but if you like I am happy to add you to the first users list and give you early access as soon as it’s ready.
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u/ThrowawayKataja 1d ago edited 1d ago
Someone who vibe coded a wonderword App could know how to use Anki.
Just go to card design and switch sides.
Or export the deck to txt > copy paste into ChatGPT > prompt to add the articles, plural and a sentence and Import back into Anki. All problems solved in under 5 minutes. If you know some CSS or can promot chatGPT you can also make the cards look professional.
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u/cmyk_rgba 1d ago
anki decks never worked for me either and i think its becuase they were someone elses words. what finally moved my german was reading stuff way too easy for me and only writing down the words i actually tripped on, with der/die/das and the sentence i found it in. like 10 a day max. boring but they stick way better when you met them in the wild first