How to lower 500+ reviews

WaniKani Tips & Tricks
#1

Hi everyone! After a couple of year’s away from WK, and using Bunpro, i’m back with a lifetime subscription and wanting to advance with my kanji reading.

I read somewhere people have gotten up to a thousand reviews, i don’t know how, but in my case I’ve started out with 400+ and now I’m moving around the 500 daily. It doesn’t really bother me, I’ve got a lot to catch up on and use them as lessons i’ve completely forgotten.

I focus on lowering that number to max 400 and that keeps me motivated. Also, I always read both the meaning and reading of whatever comes up to help me get them correct and learn more quickly, it really is helping me retain the info. That and having another tab open to search WK for similar meanings and writings in order to compare kanjis I get confused.

But I was wondering if anyone else has been in such a place and what did they do get the reviews out of the way… if they ever did. Other tips would be helpful.

またね！

7 Likes
#2

I see a post about people in similar situations almost daily! I personally can’t attest to how people manage this, but I can tell you it’s done fairly often :slight_smile:

I just wanted to welcome you back as I’ve seen it’s been 3 years since your last post!

welcome-home-animated

1 Like
#3

Personally, I used the Self-Study quite a bit [Userscript] Self-Study Quiz

I mostly used it to review failed items a little more and leeches (there are some additional filters available somewhere in the api section as well). I’m not that bothered to “over review” something. (e.g. some people are worried if they use the self study script shortly before doing normal reviews) because it will sort itself out eventually and I just feel like I currently need some more time on some items.

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#4

I found it useful to use a reorder script to do reviews that were the highest SRS first (so, enlightened items, then master etc) - those ones that have the longer intervals already, I was more likely to remember (mostly), and then they were getting out of the pile for a longer time (2 weeks if I failed and they went to Guru II - more if I passed them) - then the pile was more of the apprentice/guru stuff that needs to cycle a little faster because I don’t remember them that well. Otherwise, if you can’t get through all of your reviews every day, you sometimes fail apprentice items, but then don’t see them again for days.

Lots of people reorder instead by level - starting with the lowest level item reviews and working up, and then reset to the level where they feel like they don’t really remember anything, because that lets them control the pace of levels.

#5

Interesting. On another break (not this one - yes, I’m not good with consistency :smiley: ) I did use the reorder script as well (because the backlog was huge), but I was mostly going the other way round than you did, so focusing on apprentice items. I kinda figured with the high level items it doesn’t matter if I see them a day earlier or later because the time span is that long anyway. But the apprentice items are mostly the ones that I already failed and that need more time spend on them and while I would maybe remember them today, not seeing them makes the chances higher I fail them tomorrow. However, I would just turn the script off for a bit to mix some other items in between as well.
But well, that only really matters if you can’t get down to 0 anyway.

#6

Yep - The last break I came off of was also not my only one, but was the longest (about 2 years). Repeatedly creating large piles by leaving WK for a while means getting to try more than one strategy to handle the pile. It’s always interesting hearing what works for different people.

#7

Just focus on reviews, and ignore the lessons. I’m in a really similar situation right now. I was away from WK for 2 months, and my review pile went a little above 1000. I’ve been focusing on doing 100 a day, and i’m not touching the lesson pile yet (which is at a much more managable 160). After less than a week, I’m down to 700 ish reviews. It’s not so bad, really, and I’m quite surprised with how much I still remember

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#8

I like to order by level when I work through a backlog. That way you can review items according to their SRS schedule as they come back

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#9

Thanks for the welcome!

So, do you really see posts like this? I searched a little but didn’t find any, I’ll give it another look.
So three years instead of two! I’ve been away longer than I thought! No wonder I have so much to relearn

:slight_smile:

1 Like
#10

Sorry I don’t know what ordering reviews by lesson is, how do you do that?

#11

100 a day!? And your brain doesn’t become mash potatoes by then? I usually do 60 or 70 and by then it’s just constant mistakes and no learning

#12

Hi Kamikazen, welcome back!

You can reorder reviews with the following userscript: (although i don’t use it)

It might take a while to get the hand of userscripts in general, but it’ll really enhance your experience.

The best for these amounts of reviews is indeed to just pick a number of reviews to do daily. The amount initially doesn’t really matter. One thing I would try is to do 60 in the morning and 60 in the afternoon. (or something like that). That way, you’ll probably deal with your fatigue, and get a substantial amount of reviews done. Ideally, you can get rid of a backlog in a few weeks.

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#13

Oh yes keep an eye out for them in the “New Topics” category. Lots of times people seem to have 700, or 900, or more to lower!