Bottom line: free apps cover vocabulary and grammar well, but kanji is the layer where they structurally fall short

Learning Japanese has one structural difference from most language pairs: you’re learning three things at once — vocabulary, grammar, and a writing system (kanji) that doesn’t map to sound the way an alphabet does. General-purpose apps built for “learn any language” (Duolingo being the best-known example) handle vocabulary and basic grammar reasonably well, but their kanji coverage is thin compared to what JLPT N3+ actually requires — this isn’t a criticism specific to one app, it’s a structural mismatch between a generalist app design and a language that needs a dedicated kanji-learning system.

What free gets you solidly

• Hiragana and katakana: multiple free apps and even free web tools teach these thoroughly — there’s no real gap here, and paying for this specific step is rarely necessary
• Basic-to-intermediate grammar patterns: general apps and free grammar-focused resources cover N5-N4 level structures well
• Core vocabulary: spaced-repetition vocabulary practice is a solved problem for free — this is true across nearly every language pair, not just Japanese

Where free apps structurally fall short: kanji at scale

JLPT N2 requires roughly 1,000 kanji, N1 more — general-purpose apps that treat kanji as “just another vocabulary word” don’t scale to this well, because kanji benefits from dedicated techniques (radical breakdown, mnemonic stories, spaced repetition tuned specifically for retention of visually similar characters) that a generalist app isn’t built around. This is the actual gap, not “the free tier runs out” — it’s a design mismatch, and it’s why dedicated kanji-learning tools (built specifically around this problem) exist as a separate category from general language apps.

A practical, mostly-free stack (verify current pricing before committing)

1. A general app for grammar and core vocabulary — free tier is genuinely enough through intermediate level for most learners
2. A dedicated spaced-repetition tool for kanji specifically — some are free with self-made or community decks, others are paid subscriptions with structured mnemonic courses built in; the free/paid line here is about how much structure you want handed to you versus building your own study materials
3. Free immersion content (NHK Easy Japanese News and similar graded-reader style content) to bridge from “app Japanese” to real Japanese

The honest ceiling

Free apps and free-tier tools can genuinely take a self-directed learner to a solid intermediate level (roughly JLPT N3) if you’re consistent. Past that, the limiting factor usually isn’t money — it’s speaking practice with feedback, which free apps don’t solve well regardless of budget. That’s the point where paid conversation practice or tutoring starts to matter more than any app choice.

Summary

Free apps solve kana and grammar well; kanji at JLPT N2+ scale is where a dedicated tool (free or paid) becomes worth adding to a general app, not because the general app “ran out” but because kanji needs a different kind of practice. Full study-plan sequencing, including when to add JLPT deadlines to this stack, is in [jlpt-deadline-planner] and the pillar [learn-japanese-roadmap].