I definitely feel that I don’t find a whole lot of Kanji that I DON’T know in the wild so yeah you’re probably right. Though I do think finishing WaniKani would still have been very beneficial to my learning
I think you can log in after your subscription expires, not entirely sure though. I’m sure the data stays so that you can re-subscribe if you want to so I’d assume you could log in without a subscription
Only a small percentage of users reach lvl 30 plus that is the half more useful kanji, so that is a win on my book. You can graduate to learn kanji solely by encountering them in the wild.
However this testimony tells me that: lifetime is probably worth the money and never ever stop doing reviews.
This whole thread and this line stating;
never ever stop doing reviews.
is reminding me to remind everyone else who may be in a similar position of potential review-pileup that vacation mode is an option !!
If you are getting too swamped with life to dedicate time, are feeling burnt out, etc. and you can tell you won’t be able to be attentive for any (small or large) amount of time, no shame turning on vacation mode for the time needed. Effectively serves as a pause button and won’t have things piling in the background.
It’ll always be a little grating stepping away or not making progress (especially if paying monthly), but if the alternative is feeling overwhelmed to a destructive point- remember this feature is there for you !!
100% wish I got lifetime when I started, getting it now would suck though 
Ah this is something I actually forgot to bring up - vacation mode
I always knew about vacation mode and thought about using it, but something with my breaks was that they were not planned. In fact, during them (or at least my second break) I regularly told myself that I was going to come back and do my reviews, but I just lacked the motivation so the pile kept growing. It’s a bit of a shame that theres no way to “retroactively” do vacation mode, like reset my WaniKani to the state it was in a few months ago. I understand why its not an option, but vacation mode just didn’t work as I hadn’t known that this would happen.
As you are still a student, perhaps dropping a hint
that WK would be an awesome birthday or Christmas (or other event) gift might be something that could help. I know it depends on the situation, but I expect many parents or guardians would be all for their kids wanting to study/learn. If my children hinted that what they wanted for their birthday was education/learning focused, I would be very happy.
Funny you say that, because the annual WaniKani subscription has been my birthday present from my mother for the past two years. I could ask for it again, but just unsure especially with this big review pile and the fact that I’ve lost a lot of knowledge
Hi. It’s a shame the SRS is weighing you down if you want to keep going and still have subscription time left. Have you considered exporting WK levels 31 to 60 to Anki?
I assume there will be stuff you won’t get that way, like the lesson format and the mnemonics. And probably not the audio either. But you can still use the Self Study script to access audio and pitch, and there might be a way to import that to Anki too.
You will still get the by-levels ordered and curated list, which reinforces the kanji, and you’ll leave your L1-30 review backlog behind. If you are disappointed you won’t be learning them, that might be a “good enough” solution.
However. Although it’s a terrible solution for most people, you could also consider a reset. See how far back you have to go to cover most of your Apprentice backlog (what would going back to level 20 do?). If you would otherwise give up, perhaps nuking some of your progress has a slim chance of helping you continue, while giving up gives you no chance. I wouldn’t leap into it though. Check it out carefully before you blitz it.
Let me add congrats on reaching level 30 in the first place.
I didn’t have time to add my story to the pile, but now I can: I’ve reset WK twice now. I would say I was in a similar situation to yours - lots of leeches, couldn’t get through the review pile no matter how much I grinded… First I got to about level 40 and reset 20 levels back, then got to almost 50, then reset 20 back again. Then a year or two passed and now I’m back (since New Year’s because that’s when I got -50% on monthly for the following 12 months). Even after all this time, the reviews I’m going through feel so easy compared to before. But even so, I don’t want to reset for a third time, so I’m going slower this time (around 10 days per level).
Anyway, I don’t want to be that guy who’s like “You can do it, you can do it!” If you can learn by reading/watching/gaming/whatever, I think that’s the superior option anyway, so go do that if you can. It’s a natural SRS anyway, and you also learn from context, start understanding sentences etc. For grammar I recommend this series. He also has videos for N4, N3 and he’s slowly going through N2 now.
Just to add to the pile, this is my 3rd time trying to learn Kanji and this is also the most successful one so far! I first started in late 2020, got to around lv20, and gave up slowly after 4.5 months, ironically going to Japan let my reviews piled up and I couldn’t come back to clear it.
Then on Jan 2023, I reset down to lv1 and tried again, but this time I gave up even sooner at lv10 cause I was too free and also trying to cram in grammar to ‘catch up’ too much I burnt out.
This time I started again on Jan 2025, picking back from from the last time without resetting. There was a pile of 1000+ reviews waiting for me, I spent an entire month clearing it before I started doing any new lesson. I think I kept going at the reviews until the items in the apprentice stage was below 100 before I started new lessons.
What I want to say is that I get the feeling. There are some vocab/kanji I stuck on a lot as well, I kept getting it wrong multiple times, but since this is my 3rd time trying, I’ve learnt to just accept it. If you want to continue, maybe try forcing yourself to slowdown might help as well. But as others have mentioned, at lv30 Wanikani you already learnt the majority of the more common kanji. Starting to learn more grammar and learning through native contents might be a more engaging and less stressful (at least it was stressful to me).
Trying to memorise the vocab in isolation, like here on Wanikani, is harder than trying to read it with context as well.
I definitely emphasize with this after reaching lv30, reviews became harder. I felt obligated to keep the same pace but it did not feel realist. I did not take a break like you instead I just slowed down the pace. I would suggest you try and do the same. Come back, get the reviews down first then start on a much slower pace. Maybe 1 item a day.
Keep measuring and tracking. The big mistake with SRS is that we get into a robot mindset. Because something worked in the past does not mean it should work now. Life happens and you HAVE to adjust. It is not a sign of shame to reduce the new items you are introducing if its going to keep you at it.
I always think it is better to keep adjusting to my reality and to keep an eye on the prize. The prize is to learn Japanese. It is long and arduous but you need to keep focused on the learning. As long as you are learning you are improving.
Don’t obsess over reaching lv60, that will come in time. Just worry about what you can do today.