To prove a point
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If I do it slow, I know I’d give up eventually. After 35 years, you get to know yourself well enough to sense these things. But if I do it at a decent pace, I know I’ll be done with it in just over a year. I don’t want to be doing this for 3 to 5 years. That would be madness. Also, my goal to be able to read manga keeps me well motivated to do it quickly 
3 Likes
Level 1 goes quite slow, which I think is where most people complain. The radicals don’t necessarily make the most sense (I’ve heard Japanese people call the “flower” radical “grass” before, and mullet? ~~) and the penalty for getting something wrong can really set you back. I think by the time you reach level 3 or 4, you’re going to start feeling overwhelmed with 60+ unlocks and no way to remember that much.
Also, people generally want instant gratification and don’t get how hard it’s going to be when that character rolls back around in a week, or even a month.
I can’t think of a reason why I would intentionally go slower than I do. The lessons are there. The reviews are there. So I do them.
If other people prioritize other things in their life, that’s fine… But I don’t have a reason to do WK slowly.
6 Likes
Impress and marry Koichi or someone from the office. Also to get rid of some of the characters used for mnemonics
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I’m on a year subscription, gotta make the most of it
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If @Naphthalene beats me, I’m totally reseting to level 1 just to beat them back.
7 Likes
I can think of no better reason
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Short answer: because I am mortal.
Long answer: My favourite Borge’s short story.
1 Like
I’m a fair amount older than you, and I look at it the exact opposite way. If I’m still learning and enjoying Japanese when I’m retired, then that’s great in my book. It will give me something to do and keep my mind active. Until that time, my plan is to tackle it at a decent, but not tortuous, pace. So far, I’m finding it quite satisfying.
1 Like
No worries, you already won 
7 Likes
I’m taking the slowest route. Five to ten new words a day plus reviews whenever. It takes me a very long time to work through wanikani but it’s smart to me.
Why?
Because there is a limit to how much new vocabulary you can effectively learn in one day. Some studies say 25 words, but most say 15 is the max.
I am living in Japan right now, but I’m looking to make this long-term learning, which means not chugging 40+ words of new vocab a day.
Other people may have different experiences, which are totally valid. For me, I know that it doesn’t stick if I do it in mass batches, even with SRS.
5 Likes
Or you can create a brand new account, so eventually you’ll have two accounts at level 60.
And you can give advice to your newer user
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I did it mostly just to keep myself motivated. That being said I don’t recommend going full speed for everyone. It can cause burnout pretty bad. I’m currently dealing with the backfire of going at almost full speed the entire time. Let’s just say that I’ve had to catch up from an enormous load of reviews… twice three times. Lord help me.
2 Likes
I went fast for three reasons:
- Words are best retained when you encounter them in multiple places, with context. Finishing WK as fast as I could allowed this to happen as often as possible.
- I decided early on that I want to have a huge vocabulary in Japanese, because if I’m ever going to be “”“fluent,”“” I don’t want to be limited at every turn by unknown words. There’s no shortcut for acquiring this— start early, be consistent, don’t stop.
- Studying grammar becomes much easier when you can at least read the words everywhere you look. Taking this idea to the extreme, I’d rather have a massive vocabulary with which to learn and reinforce grammar, than have a deep understanding of grammar but get stuck on every other kanji.
10 Likes
Because wanikani’s methodology and mechanisms are in resonance with my competitive spirit. Also, one of the first things I saw were @jprspereira’s stats, I’m striving to beat that. So far, so good. Obrigado pela inspiração (why do I feel you are called) João Pedro Sensei 
Also, I want to be a polyglot and a rocket scientist in life, and I’m all out of rockets.
3 Likes
At the fastest pace it can take someone MAYBE a year at the most fast. if u go slow it could take 4 plus years to finish the 60 levels, which is unrealistic. its better to learn the radicals, kanji, and vocabulary, as soon and efficiently as possible. Also going at the speed wanikani sets for you, i feel like you learn better, because it pases u already. Of course its up to you but I dont recommend it. Try investing 2ish sessions a day for a year or two, works the best from what I’ve seen!
2 Likes
I’m going relatively slowly. I get overwhelmed pretty quickly so I try to do between 10-20 new items a day and the reviews whenever they pop up.
I have no idea how long this will take but I know if I know that if I overload myself too quickly I’ll give up
To increment the integer
level++;
5 Likes
Well the thing is, there’s such a thing as going too fast for retention, but there’s also such a thing as going too slow.
If you go too fast, the SRS will catch you at a later review and make you do it over. You shouldn’t guess when that’s going to happen, make it tell you. If your later review accuracy gets horrible, maybe slow down.
On the other hand, if you’re going so slow you’re waiting a whole day or more to do the 4-hour apprentice 1 review or the 8-hour apprentice 2 review, your accuracy at the earlier reviews is going to suffer. Un-intuitively maybe, some people need to get better about doing the reviews on time, which kind of naturally results in doing WK fast-ish.
The bottom line is, if you can keep up with the lesson and review workload time investment (which should level out at slightly more than 9 times the speed you do lessons, eventually), there’s no downside to trying to go fast. It will slow you down if you need it, and accuracy takes care of itself. And if you like going slower, do it by throttling lessons, not by letting reviews go overdue.
2 Likes