The links are there for a reason guys. Even if you already know the grammar rule, spending 5 minutes reviewing it will only be a good thing. Don’t skip the links.
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To add on to my previous comment. Seeing that bunpro is trying to look like wanikani, advertising to the wanikani crowd and for the time I used it seemed to work kinda like wanikani. Saying bunpro is not suppose to teach is kinda like saying wanikani doesn’t teach kanji it only reviews you on it, suppose to learn the kanji somewhere else. Bunpro to at me during the lessons does try to teach grammar, but I may be misunderstanding the lessons feature on bunpro.
I must admit that the most disappointing part for me in Bunpro is that it does not teach. The fact that external sources are used instead of proprietary copy makes me terribly uncomfortable. I know it’s a review platform; I’m just disappointed that it doesn’t teach.
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This is basically why I don’t think I’m interested. There’s value in the review platform but I can do that just as well by spending my time making a similar anki deck.
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I disagree. Wanikani focus both on teaching and reviewing, their lessons pages are indeed short lessons that explain into sufficient detail radicals, kanji and vocabulary. They go into meaning, explain readings, give examples of usage, compare to similars, etc. A Bunpro lesson page is one line summary of the grammatical structure, sometimes with hint of usage, the examples sentences you’re gonna use to reviews and a bunch of external references. But fair enough, you can either see this compiling of external sources as teaching or view it as a review focused site, but at this point is just semantics.
The whole thing about them them being “supposed to do something” because they look another page and advertise to their users (among others) to me is nonsense. They focus on very different kind of content, bunpro being almost all about grammar and WaniKani is just kanji with vocabulary that is mostly there to help fixate said kanji, so naturally one is gonna have features that the other doesn’t and do some stuff differently. Should I expect Wanikani to explain grammar points in their sample sentences because Lingodeer does it? But In the end it’s up to any consumer to see if they see value in a product of service.
I tried this and imo Bunpro provides more than you can do via Anki (and I’m saying that as someone who is very much convinced that Anki is the best thing ever for a lot of tasks).
First, I exported the entire content of Bunpro, including examples, links, everything (sorry!). Then I imported it into Anki and converted everything into cloze deletion cards because I hate typing on my phone. I added my own SRS settings and card styles which I enjoyed more than that greenish weird Bunpro design. Everything seemed good so far and I was glad to have made the switch.
Problem 1: you can either have one card per grammar point, showing one selected sentence on the front which makes it easier to remember the sentences. Or you have one card per sentence which is a higher workload than I would like to have. I could probably have solved this by including some JS logic and showing a different sentence every time or every day but I never got that far.
Problem 2 is that Bunpro does provide their own little hints (“can you say this another way?” “no, this is the version that means xyz”, “can you say it in a more polite way?”) which is something you can not replicate with Anki.
And lastly, I like having a separate app that shows me a notification badge with the number of Bunpro reviews I have to do and that is just focusing on Bunpro. This is not just yet another Anki deck and because of that it is easier to focus on it. I haven’t thought about my Anki decks for days now since I’ve had a super busy week but I’m constantly reminded about my Bunpro reviews that are waiting for me to get back to them.
tl;dr: you can do something very similar with Anki but I think no, you can not do it just as well as Bunpro.
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I think your points are fair but its just an example for me. I don’t use anki either, and typically just study grammar on “my own time.” I feel srs was never effective for me in terms of grammar, either, though.
I would have to disagree. Hints and multiple sentences for one grammar point are achievable on Anki. The real question is whether I would prefer to set it up myself or use the service someone else already put work in.
Just about anything built into a website can be replicated in some fashion on Anki.
Actually, this I am not sure about. I seem to vaguely remember an Anki Add-on that would give you notifications, but I wasn’t able to bring it up when I searched.
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Sure you can do hints but not as smartly as bunpro does it, in an interactive way.
And multiple sentences but having only a single card for it: as I said, probably possible with JavaScript (if I could pass the info about the random selection form the front to the back of the card; didn’t try that) but I never got that far since it didn’t seem worth it without the hints. And I would bet that this is something that the typical Anki user will not be getting into because this is quite far from what Anki lets you do out of the box.
It’s also about focus and prioritization. It is different when Bunpro has its own app and I get notifications only for Bunpro. The last thing I want in my life is a reminder that I have 400 Anki reviews waiting for me at all times… And having a separate app for it just gives it a different “todo slot” in my daily habits, separate from Anki. It sounds a bit weird but there’s a psychological difference for me. I also have all of WaniKanis content in Anki (again: sorry… ) but I never use it whereas I use WaniKani multiple times per day.
Also working and disabling and enabling lessons is much more convenient in the dedicated app than it is within Anki on a mobile device. Is there even a card browser on iOS? I only ever use it on the desktop and it is… not fun.
All in all: sure, you can do something like it in Anki. But compared to how Bunpro does it it will be less convenient and a bit of a workaround.
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I apologize. I don’t want to naysay you, but I have already built something similar. Unless it’s the terminology getting mixed up. You would need to build it into one Note and it will randomize the Cards without the need of Javascript.
The Hints however I am using a small Javascript code that could probably be expanded to act in the way that BunPro is currently doing their hints. This also something I am using in my personal deck.
My only point being that Anki is capable of doing it. It’s just whether or not a person wants to deal with building it from scratch as I have. Many times I have seen the comment “I want to learn Japanese not how to code Anki”. I certainly won’t fault someone for that. I’m just someone who geeks out on the process. 
I think here we may have a difference of perspective. I would much prefer having all my cards coming from one source. But that’s just me.
You make some valid points though. And I certainly agree that it is more convenient and user friendly to have all the UI work done for you.
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I can completely understand where you are coming from. That was also my reason why I started to migrate all Bunpro and WaniKani content to Anki. It would be convenient do use but strangely I prefer coming back to these single applications. It’s a weird psychological phenomenon I guess, maybe the context switch makes it easier: tired of WaniKani? No problem, go procrastinate by doing Anki. Tired of Anki? Do some Bunpro. When all my Japanese study time is just Anki then I have nowhere else to escape. Maybe I’m just a crazy person…
About the hints: I can’t imagine building this into Anki without a ton of effort.
I did for example just enter へ in Bunpro and the hint said “Correct, but can you use a different particle?”. I had the impression that the hints are not just a basic set of rules that you set up once but closely tied to each grammar point. I imagine that would be quite a pain to set up to get it working as well as Bunpro. Also, it would take a large part of the fun out of it for me. These unexpected hints are my favorite part that makes Bunpro interesting.
But most of all I was starting this discussion with someone who has never really used Anki and said “ah, I can do that just as easily with Anki” and I think that is highly unlikely for most users and underestimating what it would take to get this right. If a typical Anki user wants exactly what Bunpro does then I think paying for the lifetime subscription is worth it compared to the effort you would have to spend on getting approximately (but not exactly the same) experience as with Anki. Unless of course money is super tight but you have tons of time to spare and are willing to compromise.
If it was you making that statement in the beginning I think we would not be having this discussion anyway. Because yes, I’m sure you, as the grandmaster of Anki customizations 
, could come up with something. But even then you would have to gather the content: collecting grammar points per JLPT level, multiple example sentences per grammar point, marking the part that should be used for cloze deletion for each sentence, setting up grammar point specific hints… that is not a project that is quickly done in one afternoon.
But in the end it is just a matter of preference and priorities. Somewhere else there even exist people who do their kanji studies purely in Anki and they don’t see why someone would be paying for WaniKani, can you believe it? That’s just life, I guess 
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Of course you are absolutely right on this. I certainly don’t want to say it’s easy or intuitive. I just scratch my head when people say it’s not possible.
Ah the good old days when everyone insisted that Anki had no input box option. 
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I just want to say that I greatly enjoyed the cordial exchange above.
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Just scimming through here for a bit but… This seems like a nice feature to have… 
Ordered it and enjoying it as a supplement to my studies- a good site!
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I just got it too. I’m a really slow learner (which is why I got the lifetime account for wanikani too) and even though I’ll be using bunpro mostly as a supplement to Genki I and II, I still think it’s worth the money considering all the work that was put into it and all the time it will save me. Also, it’s a great idea: it amazes me how people are making it increasingly easier to learn new things, and it’s precisely the kind of effort I like to support if I possibly can. 
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Well I bought lifetime. I figured, for $90 why not. If the website crashes and burns or it ends up not working for me, it’s not much of a loss.
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Historically, they’ve discounted WK in December
Just got my free trial. I might buy it after that.
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Just consider that lifetime is $90 right now. In one week it will cost $150.
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