# Coban: Learn Japanese — user reviews > 85 indexed App Store user reviews of Coban by Akira NOGUCHI, rated 4.80/5 from 613 ratings. - Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/coban-learn-japanese/id1506009508/reviews - App overview in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/coban-learn-japanese/id1506009508.md - Rating breakdown: 5★ 523 · 4★ 63 · 3★ 17 · 2★ 3 · 1★ 7 ## What do users think of Coban? Overall sentiment: positive **Pros** - 👍 Cute and genuinely helpful - 🚀 Great app for learning Japanese - 🤩 Engaging and fun to use - 💯 Best kanji practice - 🙌 Excellent for N5 and N4 levels - 🤖 Palatable grammar for short attention spans - 🎉 Super useful and underrated **Cons** - 🐛 Occasional crashes and bugs - 🔇 Volume issues with audio - 💰 Subscription model with lack of lifetime purchase - 🤯 Confusing UI and navigation at times - 🤔 Wonky translations and quiz issues - 🙄 Annoying ads interrupting the flow **Commonly reported bugs** - Drag and drop feature not working - Crashes after completing quizzes - Vocabulary lessons causing the app to freeze **Most requested features** - Expand to higher JLPT levels (N3, N2, N1) - Add a placement test to determine user's level - Improve vocabulary practice and review options - Offer an ad-free version for a one-time purchase ## Newest reviews (12 of 85) ### 4/5 — Great App but No Sync *2025-02-26, version 4.1.6* I love this app but I use an iPad and iPhone. I want to be able to pick up where I left off. ### 4/5 — Not bad but some issues *2024-06-11* The app isn’t bad however there are some issues. The translations are a bit wonky and some of the quizzes do not specify which vocabulary words they’re looking for especially for the vocabulary words that have similar meanings. Also, the app freezes after some time of use. I can only go through one lesson before the app freezes and I have to wait to close it and restart. The customer service has been nice so if you do have some issues, there shouldn’t be any problems reaching out and getting it solved. Overall, the app has potential with some cons. ### 4/5 — Muuuch better than Duolingo *2024-05-01, version 3.5.5* It teaches you actual rules of grammar. If only every language app did this, language learning would be a whole different ball game and so much easier. The only issue is sometimes it boots me out halfway through some lessons-not sure if that’s cuz I haven’t paid for the full package, but, I’ve seriously been considering it. Gold on offer here ### 5/5 — What happened to N3? *2024-02-10, version 3.5.5* It’s a nice app, but I’ve been waiting for N3. Hope N3 can be uploaded sooner. Many thanks! ### 5/5 — Pretty good *2024-02-03, version 3.5.5* I love the lessons and the material but the performance of the app can be confusing and glitchy ### 5/5 — Très utile *2024-01-27* Pour revoir les règles de grammaire et s’entraîner en faisant des exercices. La version gratuite est certes limitée au niveau du nombre d’exercices proposés. Néanmoins, l’application est très bien faite et efficace. Je recommande! ### 4/5 — Good app overall but has a bug issue *2023-12-10* The app itself is good and the content is very useful although there is a issue when subscribing for premium as it glitched and wouldn’t let me access premium content but it eventually fixed ### 5/5 — Great for N5 and N4 *2023-09-05* One of the best apps I have used to learn Japanese, especially for N5 and N4 levels. It covers grammar, vocab, kanji + example test questions in easy to digest pieces. There isn’t much available for N3 users however, and nothing yet for N2 and N1 - can’t wait to see these in future updates! ### 5/5 — Superbe application *2023-08-22* Superbe application complète, il manque juste un mode vocal pour les petits livres afin d’avoir la prononciation exacte et un traduction Rōmaji des hiragana dans les leçons avant les exercices et elle serait plus que parfaite ! ### 5/5 — Great resource for beginner *2023-08-02* This app offers both free and subscription options for the user. For me, without the subscription, I still get a good amount of resources for reviewing the alphabets and grammar. The subscription will offer more for the learner to practice their vocabulary in reading and listening. In addition, to the resource, the interface is nice and easy to navigate. I would definitely recommend this app. ### 5/5 — Great app *2023-07-23, version 3.5.1* This app has helped me so much. Thank you very much for all the great content. You guys should make a Instagram! ### 4/5 — How can I turn off the horrible music in the background?! *2023-03-19, version 3.4.5* How to turn off the music in the background please??? ## Most critical reviews (10 lowest-rated) ### 1/5 — Romaji… *2024-06-26* Vraiment dommage qu’on ne puisse pas mettre en romaji.. car apprendre à parler et plus important que de savoir écrire pour l’instant… ### 1/5 — Unusable due to ads *2023-11-12, version 3.5.3* Can’t use it anymore without getting hit with an ad, once you’re doing seeing it, it doesn’t even take you to what you tapped on ### 1/5 — Too fast *2023-09-10, version 3.5.2* The speaker needs to slow down. I cannot get the pronunciation. ### 2/5 — Crash *2024-07-08* L’app crash au moment d’ouvrir les exercices, ayant pris un abonnement exprès c’est un peu rageant. ### 2/5 — Ad loop *2023-08-12, version 3.5.2* Every time i try to select the “conjugation” section on the home page i have to watch an ad, which ok fine. But then when the ad is over, I get sent back to the home page. I try to click the same section and the above repeats. I cant access this part of the app at all and its not a premium feature! ### 2/5 — Looks pretty but... *2021-04-08, version 2.2.0* There are a lot of ads which really interrupt the flow - it would be better to make the app paid than have this much interruptions while trying to learn Often you just can’t tap on things - input is ignored and you need to restart the app. ### 3/5 — Pubs envahissantes, pas d’achat à vie *2024-01-27* Difficilement utilisable sans abonnement car les pubs plein écran de plusieurs secondes envahissantes sont présentes à presque une interaction sur deux. Les développeurs ne proposent pas d’achat unique à vie, seulement des abonnements qui sont assez chers. Une offre à vie pour le Black Friday par exemple serait la bienvenue… ### 3/5 — Good but crashes *2023-10-02, version 3.5.2* This is a good app for Japanese study, but it always crashes whenever I click on the vocabulary lessons. ### 3/5 — A lot of recordings are missing? *2023-07-16* This app could be really amazing, but a lot of the recorded words/sentences etc. don’t always play. I think this could be a super useful tool (and I’ve paid for premium) so please fix this ASAP! Hard vocabulary mode also only gives one question before saying the entire quiz is completed? ### 3/5 — Crashes *2023-02-08, version 3.4.5* I am unable to do the “Vocabulary N5” because it keeps crashing when you do the normal mode for quiz. ## Most praised reviews (10 highest-rated) ### 5/5 — I love this app… but *2026-06-09* The new update makes it very laggy when scrolling up to the top selector for selecting what you want to study (ie grammar, vocab, kanji). It makes the site slightly annoying to use. Overall though, I love the content in the new update, the only thing stopping me from getting the premium upgrade is the lagging (You can still learn up to JLPT 3 for free.) it’s still a very good source to use, it has just become slightly annoying. **Developer response:** フィードバックありがとうございます、コアカアイさん。 Thank you very much for your feedback and for your kind words about the new content! Thanks to reports from users like you, I was able to identify the cause of the lag when scrolling to the study selector. The issue has already been fixed and is now available in version 4.2.1. I apologize for the inconvenience, and I truly appreciate you taking the time to report it. Feedback like yours helps me improve the app for everyone. Thank you again for your support, and I hope you enjoy the latest update! ### 5/5 — Incroyable *2025-09-30* Cette appli est vraiment génial, que ce soit la qualité de son interface, au contenu des cours/ leçons proposés, tout est top. La version gratuite offre un panel de démarrage dans l’apprentissage cent fois plus qualitatif que bon nombre d’autre appli entièrement payantes ! Honnêtement c’est un 10/10. ### 5/5 — Cute and genuinely Helpful *2025-09-16* I’m going to be taking the N3 this December and I was struggling with finding an app that had good grammar practice. The textbooks are a lot and can get boring easily, but so far i’ve learned a lot from this app in my 2 days using it, and it’s rlly fun, and the developer is super nice. I submitted a feature request and they got back to me in less than 24 hours. ### 5/5 — Excellente application *2025-09-03* L’application est très bien pensé, simple, bien organisé, très complète, Vivement la partie pour le JLPT N2. ### 5/5 — Génial ! *2025-05-19* J’utilise Coban pour apprendre la grammaire japonaise et c’est top ! Manque juste un système pour s’entraîner à la prononciation des mots, où et quand on doit hausser ou baisser la voix. ### 5/5 — great app *2025-03-04, version 4.1.6* was looking all around for an app to get back into learning and this is perfect. ### 5/5 — ありがとうございます！ *2025-01-28, version 4.1.6* ありがとうございます、this app is とてもかわいい! I’ve had so much fun with learning Japanese and the app is just soooo cute. It’s so good with the little stories and splitting it into N5 N4 and other things. It’s so easy and fun! ### 5/5 — Look no further, this app is it. *2024-11-17* Coban is excellent for learning Japanese. From complete beginners to advanced, it has everything you need. The layout, functionality and depth of learning material is impressive. I especially find the explanations of grammar with examples and exercises to go with it useful and engaging. The developer actively updates the app and responds quickly to user inquiries/suggestions. Highly recommend, this app is one of the best. ### 5/5 — Add Russian language *2024-10-09* 👋🏻 ### 5/5 — Best kanji practice *2024-08-18, version 4.0.3* Best kanji flashcards for learning and review --- *Data collected daily from the US App Store and indexed by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/). User reviews are verbatim App Store reviews. Ratings, prices and chart positions refresh continuously; this snapshot is from 2026-09-06.*