Umi - Language Learning

Hats off to the dev team! SRS, native media curation, subtitles, video, audio; all packaged into an easy to use app. Bravo, and I can’t recommend this enough

I just tried this app for Japanese, and it’s really good for immersion and learning new vocabulary. The only problem I have with it is that it’s not completely free. I’m still in school, so I don’t have a lot of money to pay for an expensive subscription. I wish it was free like Duolingo so I could get the best out of it. I understand that the developers need to have money, but I hope there will be a free option.

Please add Russian

I liked the idea, and the video clips make you feel like you’re learning relevant words. But there are many inaccuracies in the content, including some conjugations of verbs that then get recognized as completely different nouns. For example, in Spanish, nota can be a conjugation of notar as well as its own noun. I stopped using the Korean version because there were far too many inaccuracies and false translations such as this. The video clips for Korean were also much shorter and not as helpful. I paid for a year of subscription, but I really regret it. At this stage of the app, it should not be worth that much money.

Tldr: Good idea for an app. It’s a good supplementary tool. Immersion learners won’t be as bored reviewing on here like with Anki. Won’t get you fluent or advanced without using other immersion content. App is also buggy and is still being updated. Some context: I did Korean up to upper advanced because i’m already fluent and was curious how this app handled Korean. Currently studying Japanese and reached lower advanced. I paid for a lifetime membership. Also have used other apps like anki, memrise, quizlet, and even duolingo. Pros: I think this is a great idea for a language learning app. I have the lifetime membership because I think this app has a lot of potential. It has engaging flashcards which are good for consistency, has many clips to study from, and has an endless scrolling mode which is kind of like a language learners version of reels, shorts, or TikTok. You can tap words to see their definition which is cool too. Cons: Buggy. Answers are shown early when doing reviews. This one really annoys me so I wrote it first. I literally have to avert my eyes when going onto the next word because the answer to the card flashes right before the front of the card even loads. Also many words are spelled incorrectly in sentences, some audios don’t match sentences, some words are not used in the proper context, some definitions don’t make sense or don’t match the example sentences given, the video loading is rough and sometimes the next word I am reviewing still has the previous word’s clip before finally loading the current word’s clips, some words don’t have definitions, word’s that are in the advanced section aren’t actually advanced for the most part at least in the case of Korean, and I noticed an overall quality difference between Korean and Japanese. It feels like more time was spent polishing Japanese. (Or maybe the quality just dropped since my Korean is at a higher level. I only noticed the issues with Korean when I got into the upper levels.) To be honest, it doesn’t feel like a native Korean looked over these words because some of the mistakes I saw would never happen if someone at least fluent had their eyes on the word list. I reported the specific ones I saw so I hope they get sorted soon. This is my first app store review as far as I can remember. I really think this app has potential and wanted to share the issues so that the app does better. I heard that the team is small so I can imagine it’s a lot of work. But please don’t give up

If you are enthusiastic about learning Japanese, this teaches you using mediums that you are familiar with and makes it easy

Good but some of the French clips aren’t saying the target words but similar words.

I currently use the app for Japanese. I really love the way it uses scenes from anime and other TV shows to help study. That’s what I think puts Umi above most other language learning apps. HOWEVER there is one major claw, imo. There is like, 0 structure to the words they teach. It’s completely scattershot, it seems like. And imo this makes it harder to memorize words. What I personally would like to see are some options to organize the words taught. Either by usage (ie, words for vacationing, schooling, office, etc) or, even more ideally imo, learn in order from the most commonly used words on down. Also, personally, I’d like an option to turn all the romaji into furigana.

I saw the ad for this on instagram and thought I’d be able to watch full shows of my choosing in Spanish. It’s literally just 3 second clips from Spanish shows and movies of their choosing. And it’s Castilian Spanish. I am looking for Mexican Spanish. I put two star because the concept is a good start. Just not what I’m looking for.

This is an amazing app. A wonderful approach that is kanji-first, that allows you to customize furigana use, romji use, etc. it uses small snippets from anime and j-drama (and I suppose k-drama, although I am not learning Hangul). This makes it very engaging, because you are getting lots of new input all the time. Then, it has several unique testing methods, like Ai-graded speech practice. Also, the speech is far superior to Duolingo, whose characters (especially the young girl character) often have unnatural intonation. Now, I LOVE duo, but this is (for Japanese at least) better. You hear actual Japanese as it is actually spoken by professional voice actors, and so the speech input you are getting is top notch. Overall, absolutely fantastic and very worth it, especially at the sale price of $50 for a year, $150 for a lifetime. The amount of money and time that goes into this app must have been astonishing. Not sure if it has a “draw the kanji” mode, but that would make a great addition to when they “introduce the word,” as finger drawing the characters does help in memorizing them. Another cool feature could be showing the meaning of the radicals that the Kanji are made of, as understanding that can help memorize the characters and lead to interesting cultural insights.