The review engine is the core of OniKanji. It's where kanji actually sticks. Here's how it works under the hood — the question types, the hint system, the challenge feature, and everything in between.
Question Types
You'll encounter three types of questions during reviews:
Multiple Choice — Four options, pick the right one. You can click or press 1-4 on your keyboard to select. Fast and great for recognition.
Text Input — Type the answer yourself. This is harder but way more effective for recall. Works for both English meanings and hiragana readings. Press Enter to submit.
Sentence Builder — You're given a set of word tiles and need to assemble them into the correct sentence. If you get it wrong, the tiles light up in a heatmap — green means correct position, amber means close, red means way off. You get up to 3 attempts before it shows you the answer.
Hints & Context
Most questions come with example context — real Japanese sentences with full furigana that show the kanji being used naturally. These appear as hints and help you work out the answer from context instead of pure memorization.
You get up to 2 hints per question. Tap the hint button to cycle through them. For reading-based questions, hints will automatically show a sample sentence with the kanji used in context — along with furigana so you can follow along.
Every hint also has an audio button so you can hear the sentence spoken aloud.
We Don't Punish Wrong Answers
This is important: there's no penalty for getting an answer wrong.
Correct answers earn +3 XP toward that kanji. Wrong answers earn 0 XP — but they don't take anything away. You're never going backwards.
When you get a question wrong, it gets requeued to the end of your session so you'll see it again before you're done. The goal isn't to punish you — it's to give you another shot at getting it right while it's still fresh.
For reviews, your progress saves after each answer. But the SRS scheduling happens at the session level — so just focus on doing your best and let the algorithm handle the rest.
Challenge Answers with AI
Think your answer was actually correct but got marked wrong? Hit the Challenge button.
This sends your answer to an AI that evaluates whether your response is semantically correct — even if it didn't match the expected answer exactly. For example, if the correct answer is "to eat" and you typed "eating," the AI will recognize that and accept it.
Challenges are available on text input questions only (not multiple choice — those are straightforward). If the challenge is accepted, you get full credit and XP. If rejected, the question gets requeued.
Results are cached for 5 minutes so identical challenges resolve instantly.
Show Answer
Stuck? Hit Show Answer to reveal a full flashcard with:
- The correct reading(s) and meaning(s)
- Associated vocabulary with definitions
- A sample sentence with furigana
- Audio playback for pronunciation
Once you use Show Answer, the question counts as incorrect and you move on. No challenge available after this — it's the "I give up" button, and that's totally fine. Better to see the answer and learn from it than sit there guessing.
Katakana Toggle
For hiragana reading questions, there's a katakana toggle button. When active (highlighted orange), your romaji input converts to katakana instead of hiragana. Useful for questions where the answer is in katakana — just tap it before typing.
Keyboard Shortcuts
| Key | Action |
|---|---|
| 1-4 | Select multiple choice option |
| Enter | Submit answer / Continue to next question |
| N | Skip to next question (Extra Study only) |
Keyboard shortcuts are disabled while you're typing in a text input so they don't interfere.
Typo Tolerance
The answer checker has built-in typo tolerance — if your answer is at least 70% similar to the correct answer, it'll count. It also normalizes your input by handling plurals, replacing digits with words ("1" → "one"), removing extra punctuation, and trimming whitespace. If the correct answer has multiple accepted forms (like "cat, feline"), all of them are checked.
Live XP Feedback
During reviews, a live progress bar appears after each correct answer showing:
- The kanji you just answered
- Your XP gain (+3)
- An animated bar filling from your previous XP to your new total
- Your current mastery stage (Awakened → Explorer → Mastery → Ascension → Slayed → Cooked)
If a correct answer pushes you past a stage threshold, you'll see the status change in real-time. It's a small thing but it makes every correct answer feel like progress.
Dark Mode
Hit the gear icon during any quiz to toggle dark mode. It saves to your device and persists across all sessions — set it once and forget it.
The Bottom Line
The quiz engine is designed to help you learn, not stress you out. Wrong answers aren't punished — they're recycled. Context is always available. You can challenge anything that feels unfair. And every correct answer gives you visible, immediate progress.
Just show up, answer honestly, and the system handles the rest.