Questions about learning German with Wortplay

Wortplay gives you a guided path through German vocabulary. Learn words in a planned order, review them with spaced repetition, and practice vocabulary from the same course through gender, conjugation, preposition, and cloze challenges.

The course includes more than 16,000 words and expressions across 200 levels. Common words come early, and related words, like sehen and aussehen, are kept together. Use Wortplay alongside grammar, reading, listening, and conversation.

Choosing decks, arranging a word list, and finding matching exercises can take time away from studying. Wortplay brings vocabulary and related practice into one course, with a planned order and scheduled reviews.

The idea for Wortplay came from learning Japanese with WaniKani. Its levels and steady unlocking made returning for reviews feel worthwhile. Wortplay brings that inspiration to German, with articles, plurals, verb forms, and sentence practice. It is an independent project and is not affiliated with WaniKani or Tofugu. Read how Wortplay compares for WaniKani users.

Wortplay is for learners who prefer a course to follow. You can still choose your pace, mark familiar words as known, and decide which optional challenges to practice.

Wortplay is easiest to start after trying some German elsewhere. Level 0 basics start marked as already known; unmark any you need to learn and they will appear in your lessons. Explanations and translations are in English. Wortplay focuses on vocabulary and related drills; a beginner grammar course or teacher can help you use what you learn.

If you already know some German, mark familiar words as Known already, in a lesson or on the Vocabulary page, and it counts towards the next level without ever coming up in reviews. Know more than half of a level and you move up a level straight away; the rest of it stays in your lessons and counts towards the level after.

Words marked as already known do not use your free allowance. See how free access works.

They draw from the same course. Gender asks for a noun’s article, conjugation asks for verb forms, prepositions practice phrases, and clozes ask you to fill a gap in an example sentence. Different words support different exercises.

New challenges use words you have learned or marked as already known. Sentence practice requires at least 80% familiar vocabulary and at most one unfamiliar supporting word. Answers are checked after you submit. A cloze can give you its next letter as a hint, once per card.

Each challenge has its own review queue and is optional: it does not change your main vocabulary review schedule or determine when you level up.

When do the verb patterns unlock?

The vocabulary course is in place, with more than 16,000 words and expressions. Examples, audio, and exercise coverage vary by entry. Earlier levels have more supporting material; later levels are still being expanded.

The course draws on dictionary and vocabulary sources, with filtering, ordering, and editorial revisions.

Pronunciation clips are AI-generated, mainly with Microsoft Azure’s German speech voices, with selected clips from OpenAI voices. They are synthetic speech. Some clips may sound unnatural, and clips are being added and improved.

If a clip is unavailable, word playback can fall back to a German voice on your device, where supported. Sentence listening challenges use the audio available for that exercise. The voice and coverage can therefore vary.

Yes. The course includes language used in news, law, and history, including difficult subjects. None of it comes up in the free levels. Later, the first time a lesson reaches a word from one of these categories, Wortplay tells you what is coming and asks whether to include that topic or leave it out. You can hide categories ahead of time, or change your answers, in Settings → Content.

Hidden categories are filtered from lessons, reviews, word lists, and tagged examples and challenges. These are specific topic filters; they do not remove every reference to crime or every subject you might find uncomfortable.

Yes. Wortplay currently runs in your browser on a phone, tablet, or computer. Sign in to access your progress across devices. Native iOS and Android apps are planned, with no release date announced.

Completing a vocabulary course does not establish a CEFR level. Wortplay includes vocabulary for everyday life, work, society, and more demanding reading, but advanced proficiency also involves understanding and using German across listening, speaking, reading, and writing.

Use the course to support your broader German learning, including grammar study and real conversations. What the levels A1 to C2 mean, and how the course tags its words by level.

There is no fixed completion time. The course spans 200 levels, and your pace depends on new lessons, review accuracy, and how much German you already know. Review waits also affect when levels open.

For scale, introducing 16,000 new entries at 15 a day would take almost three years, before allowing for breaks or finishing the later reviews. Marking familiar words as known can shorten the path. A level milestone is useful progress even if you never aim to finish the entire catalog.

Get started with Wortplay.

You can learn 2 levels’ worth of new vocabulary free, with no time limit. Words you mark as already known do not use that allowance, so the free range can extend further through the course, up to Level 20. Choose a subscription when you want to learn beyond your free allowance. Your progress stays with your account when you subscribe.

Present-tense practice starts at Level 1, followed by separable verbs at Level 2. Perfekt practice requires more present-tense experience:

• Regular Perfekt: Level 5, after completing all six present forms for 30 different learned verbs.
• Other supported Perfekt forms: Level 8, after 60 verbs.

Each verb also needs its own completed present group and a familiar auxiliary. New present groups come before new Perfekt groups; forms you have already practiced keep their scheduled reviews.

Start with your scheduled vocabulary reviews. Add a small lesson when you have room for new words, and choose an optional challenge if you want more focused practice. You can pause and resume your main study session.

Choose your lesson batch size and daily review cap in Settings. The cap applies to your main vocabulary reviews; challenges have separate queues. You do not need to empty every challenge queue to make progress through the course.

A lesson introduces a small batch of new words, five by default. For each word you read its meaning, its article and plural if it is a noun, and any notes or example sentences, and you can hear it spoken.

Then comes a short quiz. You type the English for each German word and the German for each English one. A word counts as learned only when you have both right. It then enters Apprentice I, and its first review arrives four hours later, or two hours on levels 1 and 2.

You can change the batch size in Settings, from 1 to 20 words. If you would rather choose the words yourself, Choose specific words on the Lessons page lets you pick them from your unlocked level.

A review asks for each due word in both directions. When both answers are right, the word moves up a stage and waits longer before its next review: from hours at Apprentice to months at Master. After Master, a word is Known and leaves your reviews.

A wrong answer comes back a few questions later in the same session. Once you have answered it right both ways, the word drops back instead of moving up: one stage for one or two mistakes, two for three or four, and twice as far once it has reached Adept.

Article mistakes and certain related answers can be retried without lowering the word’s stage. See how answers are checked.

Choose Strict, Standard, or Forgiving spelling in Settings. Capitalization and keyboard alternatives such as ae for ä are accepted in every setting.

A forgiven typo counts as correct, and the correct spelling is shown. Umlaut-only differences follow your spelling setting even when they produce another word, such as drucken for drücken. Other recognized German words are not accepted as typos: Beet is not Bett.

Articles are checked separately from the noun. In Standard and Forgiving, a one-letter article typo is accepted when it clearly identifies the right article, such as diee Region for die Region. The noun can also have a typo within your spelling setting.

Some answers prompt another try without counting as a mistake:

• The wrong article. der Erfahrung for die Erfahrung, even with the word itself slightly misspelled. An unclear article such as dir Region, which could mean der or die, also prompts another try. In Strict, article typos always need correcting. You can stop requiring articles in Settings.
• A related word. Another word that also means the same thing, when it is not the one being asked for.
• The wrong form. das Englisch when the adjective englisch is wanted, or the noun for its verb. The question names the form it wants.
• A near miss in a lesson. The word was only just shown, so the right spelling is shown and you type it again.

Other question types: English answers use at least Standard tolerance, even if German spelling is set to Strict. Conjugation answers use no more than Standard tolerance; missing umlauts and ie/ei mix-ups are not forgiven, because they can change the verb form.

Outside Strict, an ie/ei mix-up that produces another recognized form, such as entscheiden for entschieden, prompts another try and names the form you entered.

Set a daily review cap in Settings to work through your oldest due vocabulary in smaller batches. The remaining reviews wait for another day.

You can reduce new lessons while you catch up. Your daily lesson goal is a target, not a requirement. Optional challenges have separate queues and do not need to be cleared to unlock the next vocabulary level.

Lessons come from your current level. When you have started every word in it, the next batch arrives with the next level, so the way to more lessons is to keep up with your reviews.

Words you mark Known already count as finished, which gets you to the next level sooner. There is no daily limit on lessons. The daily lesson goal on the dashboard is a target, not a cap.

Get 80% of your level's words to Adept. It only has to happen once. A later mistake that drops a word back will not lock the level again.

Adept is four correct reviews after the lesson, so a level takes at least three and a half days. Levels 1 and 2 have shorter waits and go faster.

Once a day, with your lessons and reviews at zero, you can use a Rare Candy to jump to the next level straight away. The level you skip still has to be learned: its words are added to what unlocks the level after. It changes the order, not the amount.

A level you mostly knew already works the same way without the candy: mark more than half of its words as Known already and you move up at once, with the rest of the level added to the next unlock.

On any keyboard, type the letter followed by a colon: a: becomes ä, o: becomes ö,u: becomes ü and s: becomes ß. Capitals work too.

You can also spell them out: ae, oe, ue and ss are accepted wherever the answer has ä, ö, ü or ß. On a phone, press and hold a letter to choose its accented form.

Not at the moment. You can send a single word back to Apprentice from its page, but there is no way to reset a whole level.

Not at the moment. If a backlog has built up, set a daily review cap in Settings. Your reviews then arrive in manageable portions, oldest first, and the rest waits for the next day.

Open Account & subscription from the account menu and choose Manage subscription. That opens your billing page, where you can cancel, switch between monthly and yearly, update your card or download invoices. You keep access until the end of the period you have paid for, and your progress is kept if you come back later.

Open Account & subscription from the account menu and enter the new address. A confirmation link goes to both the old and the new address. The change takes effect once you have opened both.

Wortplay does not use usernames. Your account is your email address, which you can change under Account & subscription.

Open Account & subscription from the account menu, choose Delete my account and type delete to confirm. Everything is removed immediately: your progress, notes, streak and history. It cannot be undone.

Download your progress backup from Settings first if you want to keep a copy of your study data. The file is yours to keep; the app cannot load it into a new account.

A subscription includes access to every course level and all available study modes, examples, and audio, with no separate study-mode add-ons. Levels still unlock as you progress.

Supporting material varies by entry and is being expanded. See content coverage for what is available and what is still being added.

The plans are $8 a month, or $76.80 a year, which is 20% less than paying monthly for a year. Both include the same course and available study modes.

Subscriptions renew until canceled. You can manage your subscription from Account & subscription and keep access through the period you have paid for. Checkout shows the price and any applicable taxes before you subscribe.

Compare the free, monthly, and yearly options.