Gfaster's Japanese YouTube channels

With how algorithm driven YouTube is, finding channels in Japanese to learn from can be quite difficult, so I thought I would share a few of the channels I came across that have helped my learning. I hope to update this list as time goes on and I find more!

Instructional Channels
These are all channels made explicitly for language learning. Regardless of if they are En → Ja or Ja → En, a lot of what we learn at first is focused around linguistics, so I’ve found I can recognize a lot more words here.

  • Meshclass Japanese - Japanese lessons in Japanese. All videos have native subtitles as well as subtitles in numerous languages (including english). It’s always fun to go through the comments seeing how many different languages are thanking 先生.
  • Kevin’s English Room - An American and two Japanese people walk into a video… This channel is intended for Japanese people to learn English and more about American culture, however it’s great for trying to learn Japanese as well. There is a natural dynamic between the three and there is a lot to pick up on, even with my abysmal Japanese skills.
  • サマー先生 - Summer Sensei is another channel intended for Japanese people to learn English, but like with Kevin’s English Room, I found the familiarity of topic (English concepts) make for an understandable video.
  • 日本語の森 - Like Meshclass, 日本語の森 has Japanese lessons in Japanese with native subtitles. While in my humble opinion, the lessons aren’t nearly as good as Meshclass Japanese, they are more numerous, and have proven to be useful to watch.

Entertainment Channels
These channels aren’t meant so much for learning, but they can be great practice in addition to fun content.

  • Konbini Confessions - This guy is like a Japanese Eric Andre, intereviewing random people on the streets with wild questions. It’s hilarious, uncomfortable, and not great for learning due to the hardcoded english subtitles, but I still found value in it.
  • かっしーチャンネル - Basically a Japanese Internet Historian. He talks very fast, but if you’re familiar with the subject it can definitely be helpful to learn.
  • Vtubers - You know I wouldn’t be able to write a post about Japanese Channels without mentioning them. I’m going to combine them all into one entry because there are so many. The one thing to be careful of it that like anime, they often talk in a way that is absolutely playing a character, so you don’t want to rely on them too much. But still, having longer form videos to listen to frequently is still useful. if I may share some of my favorites here, I would have to pick Okayu, Choco, and Roberu as I found all of them to be fairly easy to understand and fun to watch.
  • ラムダ技術部 - I’m unsure how to describe this channel, it’s ostensibly tech, but it’s really more a variety channel. Once again, the narrator talks quite fast, but having videos on what is often fairly technical things is really interesting, especially to me as a more techy guy.

That’s all I have for now, but I will try and update this post as I come across more channels. If anyone has other channels to share, let’s hear them! I have yet to fully populate my home page with Japanese to watch and therefore learn!

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It would be great if you also shared these channels in the Ultimate Additional Japanese Resources thread. :slight_smile: There’s always room for more great learning resources!

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