I would like to know how many items you have to do each day.
How many items do you have in Apprentice/Guru?
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Well, I usually do all the reviews I get per day (150-220ish). I keep my apprentice less than a hundred at all times so I donât get overwhelmed. I usually do as much vocab first as possible and make sure I get all the radicals correct each time. For kanji, I do quite many per day because I have a good basis for kanji and learn fast. I actually donât have a set amount but itâs almost all the new items I get at a time.
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On levels 19 and onward you get approximately 130-170 lessons per level, so for the sake of simplicity lets say an average of 150 per level.
If you want to do 8 days per level, which is comfortably fast and doesnât require doing reviews at 4 in the morning, the minimum amount of apprentice items per day is around 75.
You can do 75 items in the first 4 days (which must include all the radicals) and the other 75 items (including the newly unlocked kanji after guruing radicals) in the other 4 days.
This is all hypothetical for the sake of calculating the minimum amount of apprentice items, and requires 100% accuracy on the radicals and on the second batch of items.
In reality, there is no need to do 75 items per 4 days since your accuracy will always be below 100% so youâll want to do as much as you can in the first 4 days and leave only the critical items for the other 4 days.
I think I consistently have around 150 apprentice which includes some leftover items from previous levels.
I average 8 days 9 hours per level on 97-98% accuracy.
People chant âless than 100 apprentice itemsâ mantra but I think 150-200 is easily manageable if you have the time and energy to go faster.
Screencaps for proof
https://imgur.com/a/gvczA
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I just levelled up so I havenât gotten to all the new lessons yet (36 lessons left atm). I do lessons gradually, I have a couple of days before i guru the level 16 radicals so Iâll probably do 10-15 lessons tonight and the rest tomorrow. I try to keep the apprentice count below 100, but if I have critical lessons Iâll do them as long as it wonât bring the apprentice count above 120.
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My wanikani ride is a little bit bumpy.
I use the anti-burnout script to manage my items. But in the past 5 levels I only did kanjis and no vocab 
.
I currently have 550 vocab lessosn waiting.
The curse of wanting to learn fast and beeing lazzy I guess
Do you guys use the reorder script?
@Nedeli , @gzovak , @matildar
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Affirmative.
I use the reorder script to get to the critical lessons first, but I always make sure to finish all of the lessons before getting the next batch (so I have 0 lessons left right before I guru the radicals for each level, and 0 lessons right before I level up). So that way I avoid the backlog that you have lol.
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From like level 5 to 45 I did 20 items per day and maybe now and then 25 and I was never more than half a level behind in vocab. After you get to that level 46 point, though, workload increases if you wanna go fast. So I maintain that 20 or 25, except for the days I have kanji, then I do them all. My apprentice at that 7-7.5 day level pace was usually 80-100, now itâs been 90-130.
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Time to be wary now, a lot of swiftrunners get smashed by a wave in the early 50s 
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Itâs starting to get bumpy not gonna lie. Finally burning things means a lot more reviews. The max number Iâve had at one time was like 280 because I didnât feel like doing vocabulary over the weekend.
I also use the Reorder Script. I always do radicals and kanji on the same day and then stagger the vocab over the next few days usually doing 20 or so a day.
When a review comes late at night (like midnight this last level) I usually just do the radicals then when I wake up I do the new kanji.
Iâm totally set on continuing this pace but I hear that 50âs wave is tough. Weâll see.
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I aim for 7 days per level and find it quite manageable for times. It also gives you a weekly routine that never changes, which is something that I quite like. Some of the reviews are early in the morning (like 6AM) but I have to wake up at 7AM for work anyway so a very small change for me. Iâll have to be careful and intentionally slow down at level 26 to ensure I keep the routine! Maybe a nice 3 day WK break!
My week looks something like this:
| Type: | Radical & Kanji | Vocabulary |
|---|---|---|
| Lesson | Sunday 5PM | Monday 6AM |
| Apprentice II | Sunday 9PM | Monday 10AM |
| Apprentice III | Monday 6AM | Monday 6PM |
| Apprentice IV | Tuesday 6AM | Tuesday 6PM |
| Guru/Lesson | Thursday 6AM | Thursday 6PM |
| Apprentice II | Thursday 10AM | Thursday 10PM |
| Apprentice III | Thursday 6PM | Friday 9AM |
| Apprentice IV | Friday 6PM | Saturday 9AM |
| Guru/Level Up | Sunday 5PM | Monday 9AM |
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I try to keep my apprentice at 100 at all times. Sometimes I go slightly above and sometimes when it falls below, I donât get it right back to 100 right away. I might wait a day or two. I also usually space out my lessons throughout the day because I do my reviews as they come up (when I can) rather than only doing them once in the morning and once in the evening like a lot of others say they do. I prefer the small review batches throughout the day. But I always make sure to not have a backlog of lessons. I get somewhere between 95-120 reviews per day, on average, Iâd say.
Yep! Canât imagine using wanikani without it anymore lol. Although, I do feel like I still havenât found the perfect rhythm for me. I lke to experiment but also the only reason I can go this fast is because Iâve studied Japanese for years (Iâm only lacking in kanji) so everything is not completely new to me.
90 / 566 / 558 / 796 (Apprentice to Enlightened)
I find itâs easier to just check in twice a day, once in the morning and once at night, and just force yourself to do all the reviews. I never leave anything for later. When you get new lessons, clear those out as well. Being a Chinese speaker, I generally cheat on the radicals because it doesnât make sense for me to memorize a random mnemonic for radicals I already know. I also donât really think it helps since you will never need to speak or write in radicals so to speak, but if itâs helpful to you then by all means learn them Wanikani style. Some days are easier at 50-80 reviews, other days can be over 200. Tomorrow I have 262.
The whole thing just comes down to time. It takes something like 2500 hours of good experience with Japanese for people without any Asian language experience. If you can make the time, you will get farther faster. Unfortunately, there really isnât another magic bullet.
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So I used to use exactly this schedule (but I maintained it weekends too, =P). Since I was aiming for 7 days level ups, and a level typically has around 170 items, it requires me to do around 25 lessons a day. To make the math simpler, I assumed 13 lessons at 6 am, and 13 lessons at 6 pm (this is more than youâre really doing, so the numbers will be slightly high).
Assuming you get 100% reviews correct, youâll always have either 13 items in Apprentice 1 (at 6 am or pm), or 13 items at Apprentice 2 (at 10 am or 10 pm). Thereâll always be 26 items in Apprentice 3, and 52 items at Apprentice 4, which totals 91 apprentice items. Every day, youâll have 130 reviews purely just for Apprentice items. Eventually, youâll get another 130 reviews a day for Guru 1, Guru 2, Master, Enlightened, and Burned items.
So, in short, assuming 7 day level ups, around 26 lessons a day, 100% reviews (and doing reviews on time), youâll have 260 reviews a day, while maintaining 91 apprentice items at a time. In reality, you probably wonât get 100%, so itâll end up being a little more.
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Oh, and unless I made a mistake, youâll have 182 items in Guru 1, and 364 items in Guru 2 (546 total).
If you assume 12 lessons at 6 am/pm, it comes out to 84 apprentice items and 504 Guru items, and 240 reviews a day.
My average level up time is 7 days and 11 hours. Usually my apprentice items are under 100, and I donât think they ever went over 130.
That 80 will be 100 by the end of today.
Usually I do 20 items a day and get maybe 150+ reviews every day.
This definitely helps me understand why I find it physically impossible to go as fast as many other people do here. I found that keeping my apprentice items at 100 led to more reviews than I had time for, so I keep them between 50-75 and do about 5-10 lessons a day.
As such, it takes me about 2 weeks per level, but thatâs a perfectly fine pace for me.
Still, I was wondering how many reviews the fast levelers do, and this has been illuminating. Looks like the people going fast keep their apprentice items pretty consistently at 100 or even higher, and often end up with large amounts of reviews per day. So itâs no wonder Iâm not going as fast as they are, even using the reorder script to get my radicals and kanji lessons asap.