As a “returner” at lv20, something was off. This was part of it 
+1 to bringing back on’yomi for kanji. The mental separation helped. I would expect to be able to take an educated guess at unknown jukugo words of which I have learned the kanji on WK.
I’m only on level 9 but lack of pink-kanji-onyomi vs vocab separation is starting to get confusing 
Unless there is a good reason (like onyomi is like almost never used) then stick to it
Is there a script by chance that turns pink into on’yomi?
Sorry if I missed it, I find the search function a little difficult.
i believe this is what you’re looking for:
Thank you! This actually has been bothering me quite a bit 
Aren’t there existing WK competitor systems that more rigorously stick to the proposed separation? It’s not like WK’s “moat” is super big here.
For me personally, I can’t imagine for example wanting to learn いん as the kanji reading for 飲.
I get wanting there to Be A Clearer System, but imo part of the problem is that as with all languages, the “system” consists of so many little exceptions that it’s better to let the patterns dawn on you (eg “lots of the kanji that have 亡 as a component also have ぼう as an on’yomi”) than to try and rigidly force them onto reality.
Anyway, sorry to be the “nobody asked” voice for the status quo 
my main issue with any reading changes is that it messes up my memorization, because i already had the other reading drilled into my head, and it’s hard to remember the new one.
Yes, that is going to happen to most folks. Happens to me. But it then imposes quite a restraint an any product/system where they can never fix a mistake or make any improvements (not wanting to get into whether any specific change is an “improvement” or not as that is generally subjective anyways) once they have their first user since that change will upset/mess with what that user is used to.
Over the few years I have been using WK it can be amusing to watch the threads of X users upset about a change/new feature when there was another thread of Y users asking for exactly that change/new feature. Given that I work in the software industry, that has been present from the user/customer base of every project I have worked on for the past 30+ years 
strong agreement to preferring on’yomi from me too.
like, i get it to some extent when it comes to situations where kanji are overwhelmingly used only/mostly in their kun’yomi form but i feel like the whole benefit of learning kanji is to learn the building blocks of the language which can be applied to words you don’t know as well. right now i feel like there’s too many kanji where even within wanikani you’re expected to eventually learn the on’yomi without teaching it to you directly.
yes, learning the on’yomi is a pain sometimes, especially when kun’yomi is used often. what’s even more of a pain is having a character you think you know, only to later learn that in fact you don’t know and you have to reshuffle the whole thing in your brain into what it actually means.
it’s probaly the one major problem i have with the program currently that its so inconsistent - to me, it feels like going to a coding class that’s supposed to teach you the basic patterns you use as building blocks everywhere, but then proceeds to skip over those basics. its not that skipping over the basic patterns isn’t helpful when building things, but it’s not the point of taking that class. likewise, i’m not expecting wanikani to go into the linguistic root of every character except where relevant (青葉 being a good example of where it is helpful to do exactly that as an exception).
that’s not to say the program’s bad - its great, i’m making great strides in my ability to read the language despite doing it next to a full time job - but even an optional setting which we prefer would be very nice.
Unsure if I’ve commented here, but I do also agree that it’s VERY dumb to be teaching kunyomi as the kanji reading unless there’s 0 chance the onyomi reading will be encountered. I think the threshold should be VERY high for teaching kunyomi instead of onyomi, like WAY higher than it is right now. Being able to know onyomi readings means that, for the vast majority of common words I haven’t seen before, but which have kanji I know, I can guess the readings of. If you start me off with kunyomi, I have no chance in hell of that.
In addition, OP mentioned that a lot of kanji are also standalone words, and many of them use kunyomi when they’re standalone. Learning onyomi with the kanji, and kunyomi with the standalone word is far more efficient than learning kunyomi twice, and then being blindsided with onyomi later in a bunch of other words, and then wondering why, if onyomi is so common, it wasn’t taught at all?
Adding my support to stop having the kunyomi readings for the kanji. As others have said, it often creates redundancy in the kanji vs. vocab cards. It also makes it harder to learn the onyomi readings. It is frustrating. Like just today, I got yet another vocabulary word with an onyomi reading of a kanji (答) that had only been introduced with kunyomi for both the kanji and the vocab.
Yes, I know sometimes there are multiples of each or other exceptions, but the vast majority have a most common onyomi and most common kunyomi reading that should be introduced as kanji and vocab, respectively.
It’s bad enough I get stupid ultra beginner kana-only words taking up my time when I specifically got WaniKani to study kanji. Now it’s wasting my time introducing the kunyomi readings twice.
I also tend to think that it would be more consistent to always teach the on’yomi reading for kanji, but it seems to be a design choice by Wanikani and is not that uncommon. I looked at the kanji readings with the Wanikani API, and there are 371 out of 2087 kanji where the primary reading is kun’yomi. There are even 3 where it is nanori. So that’s about 18%.
Idx WKId Lvl Kji Rdg
1 2404 36 叔 お
2 2189 52 輔 すけ
3 2397 58 菅 すが
Idx WKId Lvl Kji Rdg
1 456 1 川 かわ
2 461 2 夕 ゆう
3 467 2 丸 まる
4 474 2 手 て
5 481 2 犬 いぬ
6 489 2 玉 たま
7 490 2 田 た
8 492 2 目 め
9 856 2 々 のま
10 505 3 太 ふと
11 507 3 引 ひ
12 509 3 戸 と
13 512 3 父 ちち
14 516 3 冬 ふゆ
15 517 3 北 きた
16 523 3 広 ひろ
17 524 3 母 はは
18 526 3 矢 や
19 626 3 明 あ
20 537 4 氷 こおり
21 538 4 申 もう
22 540 4 皿 さら
23 550 4 竹 たけ
24 551 4 糸 いと
25 552 4 耳 みみ
26 553 4 虫 むし
27 554 4 村 むら
28 557 4 花 はな
29 558 4 見 み
30 559 4 貝 かい
31 560 4 赤 あか
32 1118 4 穴 あな
33 575 5 羽 はね
34 579 5 色 いろ
35 581 5 西 にし
36 582 5 何 なに
37 586 5 声 こえ
38 594 5 谷 たに
39 597 5 里 さと
40 598 5 麦 むぎ
41 600 5 林 はやし
42 603 5 雨 あめ
43 605 5 草 くさ
44 622 5 夜 よる
45 1309 5 豚 ぶた
46 627 6 東 ひがし
47 631 6 知 し
48 637 6 思 おも
49 645 6 首 くび
50 660 6 家 いえ
51 966 6 取 と
52 634 7 南 みなみ
53 652 7 付 つ
54 659 7 夏 なつ
55 663 7 紙 かみ
56 670 7 組 くみ
57 673 7 雪 ゆき
58 676 7 黄 き
59 1810 7 床 ゆか
60 693 8 森 もり
61 695 8 朝 あさ
62 697 8 答 こた
63 699 8 買 か
64 702 8 雲 くも
65 717 9 泳 およ
66 722 9 乗 の
67 724 9 屋 や
68 1880 9 辛 から
69 740 10 起 お
70 750 10 葉 は
71 751 10 軽 かる
72 755 10 飲 の
73 765 10 読 よ
74 766 10 鳴 な
75 768 10 横 よこ
76 771 10 頭 あたま
77 772 10 顔 かお
78 9051 10 頁 ページ
79 776 11 仲 なか
80 792 11 昔 むかし
81 796 11 拾 ひろ
82 802 11 追 お
83 1837 11 誰 だれ
84 822 12 島 しま
85 836 12 寒 さむ
86 838 12 暑 あつ
87 841 12 歯 は
88 844 12 湯 ゆ
89 1594 12 彼 かれ
90 865 13 様 さま
91 866 13 橋 はし
92 868 13 緑 みどり
93 887 13 鏡 かがみ
94 895 13 皆 みな
95 1883 13 俺 おれ
96 911 14 松 まつ
97 1918 14 井 い
98 8963 14 苺 いちご
99 8967 14 狼 おおかみ
100 928 15 寺 てら
101 929 15 岩 いわ
102 930 15 帰 かえ
103 931 15 春 はる
104 932 15 昼 ひる
105 933 15 晴 は
106 934 15 秋 あき
107 938 15 坂 さか
108 950 15 泣 な
109 951 15 浅 あさ
110 959 15 猫 ねこ
111 1608 15 払 はら
112 1891 15 匹 ひき
113 9381 15 舐 な
114 972 16 箱 はこ
115 973 16 荷 に
116 980 16 笑 わら
117 998 17 鼻 はな
118 999 17 側 がわ
119 1002 17 塩 しお
120 1007 17 梅 うめ
121 1020 17 底 そこ
122 1040 18 焼 や
123 1044 18 胸 むね
124 8839 18 叩 たた
125 8840 18 飴 あめ
126 8990 18 苛 いじ
127 9246 18 繋 つな
128 1065 19 若 わか
129 1070 19 舌 した
130 1553 19 芋 いも
131 1725 19 埋 う
132 1100 20 尻 しり
133 1111 20 臭 くさ
134 1112 20 厚 あつ
135 1296 20 刺 さ
136 1137 21 岡 おか
137 9259 21 貰 もら
138 9343 21 叶 かな
139 1160 22 寝 ね
140 1161 22 宮 みや
141 1173 22 藤 ふじ
142 8859 22 諦 あきら
143 8885 22 袖 そで
144 1193 23 割 わり
145 1195 23 崎 さき
146 1213 23 呼 よ
147 1214 23 城 しろ
148 1900 23 棚 たな
149 2051 23 紫 むらさき
150 8996 23 痒 かゆ
151 1220 24 違 ちが
152 1224 24 届 とど
153 1225 24 狭 せま
154 1226 24 肩 かた
155 1227 24 腕 うで
156 1228 24 腰 こし
157 1247 24 株 かぶ
158 1253 25 渡 わた
159 1257 25 抜 ぬ
160 1278 25 掛 か
161 1279 25 替 か
162 1954 25 涼 すず
163 8860 25 捉 とら
164 1308 26 汗 あせ
165 9338 26 拭 ふ
166 1321 27 悩 なや
167 1324 27 貸 か
168 1337 27 靴 くつ
169 2429 27 憧 あこが
170 1375 28 傘 かさ
171 1376 28 浜 はま
172 1866 28 沼 ぬま
173 9251 28 揃 そろ
174 1385 29 江 え
175 1403 29 娘 むすめ
176 1411 29 詰 つ
177 1414 30 渇 かわ
178 1429 30 懐 なつ
179 1430 30 押 お
180 1432 30 枕 まくら
181 1433 30 浮 う
182 8834 30 匂 にお
183 8863 30 濡 ぬ
184 9335 30 姪 めい
185 1453 31 幾 いく
186 1456 31 泥 どろ
187 1462 31 巣 す
188 1472 31 似 に
189 1485 32 桜 さくら
190 1498 32 飼 か
191 1501 32 卵 たまご
192 1503 32 捨 す
193 1504 32 込 こ
194 1509 32 机 つくえ
195 1516 33 窓 まど
196 1528 33 灰 はい
197 1542 33 裏 うら
198 8858 33 噂 うわさ
199 8994 33 屁 へ
200 1549 34 丼 どん
201 1550 34 吐 は
202 1556 34 縦 たて
203 1574 34 枝 えだ
204 1575 34 爪 つめ
205 8968 34 咳 せき
206 1590 35 亀 かめ
207 1595 35 恥 は
208 1596 35 杉 すぎ
209 1601 35 熊 くま
210 1604 35 酢 す
211 1605 35 鍋 なべ
212 1897 35 涙 なみだ
213 8910 35 喋 しゃべ
214 1617 36 伸 の
215 1621 36 幅 はば
216 1623 36 甘 あま
217 1627 36 沖 おき
218 1629 36 津 つ
219 1640 36 鹿 か
220 2336 36 漬 つ
221 8911 36 鮭 さけ
222 9265 36 炒 いた
223 1653 37 戻 もど
224 1671 37 抱 だ
225 2384 37 絹 きぬ
226 8837 37 串 くし
227 1677 38 宜 よろ
228 1678 38 繰 く
229 1689 38 奥 おく
230 1693 38 扱 あつか
231 1700 38 緩 ゆる
232 8861 38 膝 ひざ
233 8966 38 噛 か
234 1714 39 控 ひか
235 1715 39 壁 かべ
236 1718 39 片 かた
237 1726 39 埼 さい
238 1727 39 奪 うば
239 1731 39 枠 わく
240 1735 39 稲 いね
241 8912 39 宛 あて
242 1744 40 駆 か
243 1751 40 吹 ふ
244 1752 40 堀 ほり
245 1759 40 敷 しき
246 1775 41 伺 うかが
247 1777 41 瀬 せ
248 1784 41 虎 とら
249 1785 41 蛍 ほたる
250 1786 41 蜂 はち
251 1794 41 畑 はたけ
252 8836 41 嘘 うそ
253 1809 42 堅 かた
254 1815 42 揚 あ
255 1823 42 柄 がら
256 1826 42 潟 かた
257 1831 42 綱 つな
258 1834 42 芝 しば
259 1835 42 荒 あ
260 1836 42 袋 ふくろ
261 8993 42 餅 もち
262 9378 42 賑 にぎ
263 1851 43 垣 かき
264 1871 43 琴 こと
265 1877 44 刃 は
266 1879 44 桃 もも
267 1881 44 謎 なぞ
268 1882 44 侍 さむらい
269 1884 44 叱 しか
270 1889 44 梨 なし
271 1893 44 釣 つ
272 1894 44 髪 かみ
273 1895 44 嵐 あらし
274 1896 44 笠 かさ
275 1899 44 姫 ひめ
276 1904 44 芽 め
277 2466 44 狐 きつね
278 1906 45 澄 す
279 1908 45 肌 はだ
280 1909 45 舟 ふね
281 1912 45 塊 かたまり
282 1913 45 狩 か
283 1914 45 頃 ころ
284 1917 45 也 なり
285 1919 45 呪 のろ
286 1922 45 曇 くも
287 1925 45 賭 か
288 1929 45 磨 みが
289 1936 45 嫁 よめ
290 1938 45 滝 たき
291 1940 45 翔 かけ
292 1941 46 墨 すみ
293 1942 46 鳩 はと
294 1949 46 吾 わが
295 1955 46 猿 さる
296 1957 46 鍵 かぎ
297 1963 46 癖 くせ
298 1966 46 穂 ほ
299 1982 47 霧 きり
300 1988 47 唇 くちびる
301 1993 47 崖 がけ
302 2000 47 扉 とびら
303 2005 47 爽 さわ
304 2008 47 箸 はし
305 2011 47 虹 にじ
306 2013 48 蚊 か
307 2014 48 蛇 へび
308 2015 48 貼 は
309 2018 48 闇 やみ
310 2019 48 隙 すき
311 2020 48 霜 しも
312 2032 48 踊 おど
313 2038 48 咲 さ
314 2041 48 脇 わき
315 2050 49 駒 こま
316 2058 49 鶴 つる
317 2059 49 刈 か
318 2067 49 煮 に
319 2075 49 桑 くわ
320 8913 49 蹴 け
321 2091 50 鰐 わに
322 2092 50 蟹 かに
323 2099 50 堰 せき
324 2110 50 淀 よど
325 466 51 又 また
326 2123 51 挟 はさ
327 2136 51 隅 すみ
328 2143 51 媛 ひめ
329 2149 51 襟 えり
330 2153 51 浦 うら
331 2154 51 塚 つか
332 2159 52 茨 いばら
333 2185 52 乃 の
334 2186 52 綾 あや
335 2188 52 隼 はやぶさ
336 2202 53 錦 にしき
337 2209 53 据 す
338 2213 53 鯉 こい
339 2216 53 曙 あけぼの
340 2221 53 葵 あおい
341 2233 54 卸 おろし
342 2246 54 鎌 かま
343 2249 54 且 か
344 2254 54 茎 くき
345 2257 54 杏 あんず
346 2258 54 茜 あかね
347 2259 54 栞 しおり
348 2265 55 栃 とち
349 2280 55 弥 や
350 2290 55 之 これ
351 2302 56 恭 うやうや
352 2319 56 靖 やす
353 2327 56 遥 はる
354 2329 56 柴 しば
355 2337 57 坪 つぼ
356 2357 57 烏 からす
357 2360 57 楓 かえで
358 2361 57 哉 や
359 2392 58 暁 あかつき
360 2395 58 凌 しの
361 2396 58 瑞 みず
362 2402 59 峠 とうげ
363 2405 59 雌 めす
364 2406 59 堪 こら
365 2411 59 岬 みさき
366 2433 59 梓 あずさ
367 2440 60 藍 あい
368 2442 60 唄 うた
369 2449 60 升 ます
370 2454 60 婿 むこ
371 2461 60 漸 ようや
While not being an absolutist, insisting on teaching the kun’yomi as the “kanji reading” in 100% of the cases, I do think that it is pointless at least in those cases where the kun’yomi reading is always accompanied by okurigana. Why?
One minor corner case with always teaching the on’yomi as the kanji reading as a rule is that some common kanji do not have an on’yomi.
A few that come to mind for me (but almost certainly not all of the ones that WK teaches): 込, 畑, 枠, 匂. That being said, the list of common kanji where this is true seems to be quite minor. It feels to me that it wouldn’t be a bad compromise at all to have the kanji reading be the on’yomi as a rule, except making it very clear when the reading is an exception to that (such as when there is no on’yomi, or the situation @UselessMiwa points out where the on’yomi exists but is in practice never used in any common vocabulary). Under that ruleset, I wonder how many exceptions there would be across the ~2000 or so kanji WK teaches but I’d have to guess it would be less than 50.
飲食 is a pretty common word so learning いん comes in useful there.
Please note that I didn’t say that I don’t want to learn イン as the on’yomi reading for 飲 or that it isn’t useful. I want to learn every reading, my goal is fluency. What I said was that I would rather learn の as the “kanji reading” for 飲 within WK’s system, because it gets me quicker to the word 飲む, derivatives of which form (in my experience so far) more of the words I see using the kanji.
My broader point, I guess, is that I think for many of the kanji (手, 東, 目) for which WK teaches the kun’yomi, most of the complaints that I see actually would apply verbatim to the on’yomi. There are just two or more readings for many kanji, and you just have to build up a sense of when to use which one. This task actually doesn’t go away if WK teaches the on’yomi 100% of the time, because Japanese isn’t 100% logical.
That’s a great example of a kanji where remembering トウ is much more useful than ひがし. It’s a phonetic component in 凍 and 棟, so it allows you to throw away 2 artificial mnemonics.
Yes exactly, by just learning the word のむ one will be able to read all of its derivatives, as they will always have okurigana. There’s no additional benefit (as in ability to read additional words) to also remembering の as “reading” of 飲. Whereas イン is used in a dozen independent words with no okurigana to help read the kanji.
It’s clear we disagree, and I wanna keep things productive, but I’ll try one final time. I don’t mean to sound too flippant with what I’m about to do, so I apologize in advance if I’m being annoying: I just don’t feel like my point has been properly heard.
That’s a great example of a kanji where remembering ひがし is much more useful than トウ. The kun’yomi is entirely unique, but the on’yomi is shared in 凍 and 棟, so picking up the on’yomi via vocabulary and observations of similar kanji allows you to focus on remembering the tougher mnemonic.
Yes exactly, by just learning the word いんしゅ one will be able to read every word that shares the kanji, as they will always not have okurigana. There’s no additional benefit (as in ability to read additional words) to also remembering イン as the “reading” of 飲: it is used in a dozen independent words with the absence of okurigana there to help you remember to use the on’yomi, so the on’yomi reading will be reinforced naturally.
I also want to point out that 手 and 目 deserve a response in your reply that they did not get. Both 手紙 and 選手 for instance are gonna be there in the language regardless of what WK does, right? Any system is gonna struggle with the problem of the language as it actually exists. Tofugu has a blog post that describes in detail how they made WaniKani, right? If you’re upset with choices they made and that causes you to take greater ownership of your learning of Japanese by making a system that teaches only on’yomi for the kanji reading or whatever, that’s a win for your learning Japanese, so please go ahead.
Sorry, I don’t really understand the logic of the inverted argument.
You prefer to have 2 copies of the same card 東＝ひがし＝east, first as a kanji card and then second time as a vocabulary card? And you prefer to pick up 東＝トウ yourself from observing a dozen cards spread as wide as levels 6-48, instead of WK just saying “this is a phonetic component in 2 more kanji”?
To each his own, let’s leave it at that.
For both of those again it would be more productive to have different readings on the kanji and vocab cards as opposed to having duplicate cards. Both 手 シュ and 目 モク are used in dozens of words.
But I wanted to focus on the argument for phonetic components, which is why I omitted them from response.
I sure hope I don’t sound upset 
It’s just an emotionally-neutral argument for what’s useful.
Actually remembering 飲 as の is more than ignoring Okurigana. It also messes up recall of words using 飲 without Okurigana.
飲 is always followed by either m-row (ま行) or ん, that is, conjugation of 飲む. (申す is a more common mess up for しん, rather than realizing you haven’t learned a standalone reading (On’yomi) for 申 yet.)
Only that it goes against the WK style of having to learn Kanji before vocabularies. 飲 seems debatable, but I don’t know to do with 掛かる…
If it were me, I would redesign the system to not teach any reading for Kanji 掛 at all, but use single 1 representative vocab for the Kanji for the Kanji lesson instead. Teach 掛かる immediately even before 掛 get Guru’d.
I don’t have as strong opinions for 見, for instance. (Ichidan verb, not as much problem.)