If you have had the experience of learning Japanese in a classroom setting, you probably have had some exposure to the Japanese Language Proficiency Test or JLPT. If you are anything like me, you probably used the few levels of the test as a benchmark to guide your own progress through the language. Now, you have finally attained the highest level of language competency that the bureaucracy can measure. You probably spend your free time lording over N3 peasants on internet forums and boasting about watching cartoons without subtitles.

But the good times don’t last forever. Eventually you will find yourself in a phone call nervously asking the middle aged man from Aomori on the other end of the line to please repeat his question about web server maintenance in a way that your childlike japanese brain can understand. You might have your visiting friend doubt your skill when despite your thousands of hours of study you can’t translate the menu at a seafood restaurant. (They didn’t ask me about fish kanji on the N1!!) Whatever happened, the reality has hit home. You aren’t fluent. You need more study. But how can you possibly learn anything without standardized test study materials telling you exactly what to do?

If you have the JLPT N1, you should know Japanese grammar. You will occasionally see some new or irregular usage of a grammatical construct, but you should be able to easily grasp meaning from context or know how to find it quickly. At this stage, grammar textbooks are not going to be an effective learning source.

With a firm grasp of grammar, improving your knowledge in the language will mostly come from the slow process of expanding vocabulary.

To do this, I make heavy use of the flashcard program Anki. If you don’t use Anki, you probably aren’t good. If you somehow passed the JLPT N1 without Anki, you probably learned half the words I did in twice the time. Anki and similar SRS based flashcard programs are in my experience unbeatable as a way to build vocabulary recognition.

useful vocabularyuseful vocabulary

For most learners who use Anki from the very start, I recommend progressing through first the Core 2000 Vocab, then the Core 6000 Vocab. If you still want a public plug and play deck after the 6k and are approaching N1 level, you can try the Core 10000 Vocab.

Having gone through all these decks myself, I have largely exhausted the public options for Japanese that don’t involve significant crossover of words. So, my strategy has been to create my own new deck to work with.

When reading philosophical texts, taking business calls, or playing video games about underworld street fighting I encounter a steady stream of words that I have either had no previous exposure to or have forgotten. Every time this happens I add it to an ongoing text list. (I do this quickly on my phone when no one is watching me). At the end of the month I run the list through a rough card building plugin that I wrote that finds the appropriate example sentences and english definitions for each word.

At the time of writing I am adding about 100 new words a month to my review list this way. It’s worth keeping in mind that depending on the material you consume, you will come across many words that have basically zero utility in normal life.

not useful vocabularyyou don’t need to add this one

Whether or not you want to study literally every word you find is largely a matter of personal preference. Just don’t be the guy who maintains a blog about learning the word for every species of moss while not being able to hold a regular conversation. I saw this post once.

While 100 words a month is a much slower pace than what is possible with the public core decks, the fact that I am finding each word in context from native materials gives me a much stronger mental association with the meaning when I am trying to recall it. I’ve noticed that I have a much easier time retaining these words that I add when compared to some of the more uncommon ones in the core decks that I studied in isolation and rarely see in context.

Of course, when the aim is fluency, language knowledge is only part of the puzzle. You can read all the research papers and technical documentation you want and sit in a state of smug self satisfaction, but no one will be impressed while you stumble over your words ordering McNuggets.

Hopefully if you have reached an advanced level of Japanese you are able to handle most daily conversations, but it can become easy to fall into the trap of never pushing yourself to verbalize complex or nuanced thoughts. As you expose yourself to more native material while searching for new vocab, make sure to actively attempt to use the language you learn in the appropriate context.
You can usually tell if you have the right idea by watching the reaction of the person listening to you. (The blank stare of confusion and pity means you messed up) This kind of field test is a useful sanity check for some more obscure vocabulary. I’ve had the experience more than once of using a new word only to be told that an alternative is much more common in regular conversation.

While progress is more difficult to quantify, trying to hit a monthly goal for new vocabulary is at least a good motivator. The road to real mastery is unending, but years from now you will finally be able to walk into a small town anime fanclub and, having reached a level beyond even the JLPT N1, claim your rightful status as a god.