How to Learn Kanji From Zero: A Plain Starting Plan

Short answer: learn hiragana and katakana first, then start with a small set of simple kanji, such as the numbers, 日, 月, 木, 山 and 人. Learn each as a meaning plus a short story, watch how it is written, and review it the next day. Five new kanji a day is a calm pace.

That is the whole plan. The rest of this page explains each step, gives you a first week with real kanji, and points out the mistakes that make people quit in the first month.

What to know before the first kanji

You need hiragana and katakana. Not perfectly, but well enough to read them without a chart. Every reading you meet is written in kana, and so are the example words on each kanji page. If you still stop to decode か or ク, spend a week on kana first. It is a few dozen symbols, and it makes everything after it easier.

You do not need grammar, and you do not need to speak yet.

Step 1: start with kanji that are simple

Begin with the shapes that are easy to see and that show up as parts of later kanji. 一, 二 and 三 are just bars. 日 is the sun and 月 is the moon. 木 is a tree, 山 is a mountain, 人 is a person.

These are not random picks. They are building blocks. 休 (rest) is a person next to a tree. 明 (bright) is the sun next to the moon. When you already know the parts, a new kanji is a short list of things you recognise, not a new pattern of lines.

The N5 level in Kanji Guide has 81 kanji. That is a good first target, and the full list is on the N5 kanji list page.

Step 2: learn the meaning with a small story

Memorising a kanji as lines in a box is slow. A tiny story is quicker, because it gives each part a job. Here is the story for 三:

Three bars (一), the middle one shortest and the bottom one longest.

Three bars, and the story tells you how long each one is. Now look at 休:

A tired person (亻) leans back against a tree (木) with eyes closed to rest.

The story gives you the meaning (rest) and the two parts (person, tree) in one picture. If you want the longer explanation of why this works, read the picture-story method. If you have heard of the book Remembering the Kanji, this is the same general idea: meaning and shape first, with stories to hold them.

Step 3: look at how it is written

Each kanji has a stroke order, and following it makes the character look right and helps you tell similar shapes apart. You do not need to memorise rules. Watch the strokes a few times and let the order become familiar. Every kanji page on Kanji Guide has an animated stroke order. For example, 右 and 左 look almost the same but start with different strokes, and seeing them drawn makes the difference obvious.

Step 4: add readings through real words

A kanji usually has more than one reading. Do not try to memorise the full list on day one. Look at one or two example words instead. 山 is やま on its own, and in 火山 (かざん, volcano) it is read ざん, the on reading サン showing up in a compound. You will see that pattern again and again: a native reading when the kanji stands alone, a Chinese-derived reading inside compound words. Read more in onyomi vs kunyomi.

Step 5: review the next day

This is the step people skip, and it is the one that decides whether the first four steps were worth it. A kanji you saw once and never again is gone in a few days. A kanji you saw again after one day, then after a few more, then after a week, stays.

That schedule is called spaced repetition. You can do it with paper cards or an app. Kanji Guide builds your review list for you and shows each kanji again just before you would forget it.

A first week, with real kanji

This is a plan, not a rule. Adjust it to your time.

Day	New kanji	Also do
1	一 二 三 四 五	Read the story aloud once
2	六 七 八 九 十	Review day 1
3	日 月 火 水 木	Review days 1 and 2
4	人 口 山 川 土	Review day 3
5	大 小 中 上 下	Review day 4
6	None	Review everything so far
7	None	Rest, or repeat day 6

That is 25 kanji in a week. If five a day feels heavy, do three. If it feels easy, do not jump to twenty. Reviews pile up faster than most people expect, and a large backlog is the usual reason people stop. See how many kanji per day for the arithmetic.

Mistakes to avoid

• Starting with hard kanji. Pick simple shapes first, even if a complex one is on a sign you want to read.
• Learning every reading at once. Meaning and shape first. Readings come easier once you recognise the character.
• Skipping review. New kanji without review is a leaky bucket.
• Studying for two hours, then nothing for a week. Ten or fifteen minutes a day beats it.
• Waiting until you feel ready. You will learn faster by starting with small sets and adjusting.

Where to go next

Once the first 25 feel solid, keep going through the JLPT N5 kanji and then N4. Or open the study app and your first five are waiting. It runs in a phone browser and there is an iPhone app too.