Bubuling Nihongo vs Hanzi Pen
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Bubuling Nihongo
This app helps you learn Japanese vocabulary through curated paths and interactive quizzes. It offers features like word lookups, handwriting input, and progress tracking to make studying efficient and engaging.
- Curated vocabulary study paths
- Instant word lookups
- Multiple quiz modes
- Handwriting input for kanji
- Progress tracking
- Study reminders
- Cross-device progress sync
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Bubuling makes Japanese vocabulary study clear, fast, and consistent. Build your wordbook with curated learning paths, look up words instantly, and practice with quiz modes that keep you engaged every day. What you can do in Bubuling: - Study curated vocabulary, including JLPT-focused sets and beginner-friendly lists - Search by kanji, kana, romaji, or meaning - Learn each word with readings, examples, related words, and conjugation support - Use handwriting input to find kanji when you can’t type it - Practice with multiple quiz modes: spelling, meaning, listening, and conjugation - Save words to My Words and track your learning progress - Sync your progress across devices when signed in - Get study reminders so you stay on pace Bubuling Pro: - Unlimited bookmarks in My Words - Access to current and future Pro features - Monthly, yearly, and lifetime purchase options available as in-app purchases Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Hanzi Pen
Master Chinese characters through guided writing practice with per-stroke feedback. Features spaced repetition, etymology, example sentences, and measure-word coaching. Supports HSK vocabulary and handwriting search.
- Guided stroke-order writing practice
- Per-stroke feedback on writing
- Spaced repetition system (SRS)
- Character etymology and decomposition
- Real-world example sentences
- Measure-word coaching
- Handwriting search
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Hanzi Pen turns the slow, deliberate work of learning Chinese characters into a guided practice loop. Every character you encounter becomes something you can read, recognise, and, most importantly, write from memory. WHAT MAKES IT DIFFERENT • Writing comes first. Trace each stroke on screen, get per-stroke feedback on length, position, and missing hooks, and graduate to writing from memory. The app coaches you toward the actual mechanics of each stroke type (横, 竖, 撇, 捺, hooks, turns). • Spaced repetition built in. Every character you practice joins your SRS deck with independent mastery for writing, reading, and translation — track each skill on its own, mark the ones you already know, and let cards resurface exactly when forgetting starts. • Etymology that actually helps. Each character's detail page shows its phono-semantic / pictogram / compound-ideogram structure, the meaning and sound role of each component, and a prose origin story sourced from Dong Chinese. • Across Asia. Chinese shares thousands of characters with Japanese, so a character's page can show the Japanese on'yomi and kun'yomi readings, and even which hiragana and katakana the character became (安 → あ / ア). A quiet bridge for anyone who already knows some Japanese or is curious how the writing systems connect. • Real example sentences. Over 64,000 Tatoeba sentences indexed by character with mixed-difficulty selection, so you see the word used in short, medium, and longer real-world contexts. • Measure-word coaching. Every noun's detail page shows which 量词 to pair it with (个, 位, 名, 只, 条, 部 …) and explains the nuance — polite vs. formal vs. casual. CORE FEATURES • HSK 1–6 vocabulary with official-list filtering • 3,000+ characters from HSK 3.0 with stroke-order graphics, etymology, and decomposition • 110,000-entry CC-CEDICT dictionary for words and compounds • 10,800 learner-friendly single-character definitions • Multi-character word breakdown — tap any word to drill into its sub-words and individual characters, with pinyin grouped word-by-word over example sentences • "Don't mix these up" guidance — side-by-side notes on easily-confused look-alikes (重 / 垂, 土 / 士, 未 / 末, 天 / 夭 …) • Tone sandhi (一 / 不) applied to example-sentence pinyin • Multi-pinyin readings shown for every character (得 → dé / děi / de) • Handwriting search — draw a character you saw somewhere with no stroke timeout and no auto-clear, then tap a candidate • Vocabulary lists with paste-import, shuffle, and per-list practice sessions • Quiz modes: writing, reading (pinyin), translation, and combined — each skill tracked independently, and settable by hand when you already know it • Component questions: "which is the meaning component? which is the sound?" • Per-stroke coaching after each writing attempt • Live canvas resize via pinch + drag handle • Practice history with one-tap undo for accidental "I know this" • Switchable Simplified / Traditional display • Dictionary searchable by hanzi, pinyin, or English • iCloud sync across iPhone and iPad • Profile customization (avatar glyph, name, and a selectable accent theme colour) WHO IT'S FOR • HSK 1 / HSKK beginners drilling the first 600 characters • Heritage learners filling in writing gaps • University and high-school Mandarin students preparing for proficiency exams • Anyone serious about character recall! Writing, not just recognition PRIVACY All learning data lives in your private iCloud space. No accounts, no ads, no analytics, no server-side tracking. Nothing leaves your device except the iCloud-synced records that only you can read. OPEN-DATA ATTRIBUTION Built on CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0), Tatoeba (CC-BY 2.0 FR), Make-Me-a-Hanzi (LGPL / Arphic Public License), chinese-lexicon (ISC), and Dong Chinese wiki etymology (CC BY-SA 4.0).
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Hanzi Pen at none against Bubuling Nihongo's 3. Bubuling Nihongo's advantage is iOS requirement (16.4 vs 26.2). On price, rating, ratings volume and update cadence there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Bubuling Nihongo sells 3 in-app purchases, starting at $0.99 per month. Hanzi Pen asks for nothing beyond the download.
On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 5.0 for Bubuling Nihongo against 5.0 for Hanzi Pen. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 1 and 1 respectively.
Both ship on a similar rhythm, roughly fortnightly. The most recent releases landed on October 8, 2026 and October 15, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Bubuling Nihongo | Hanzi Pen |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 5.0 (1 ratings) | 5.0 (1 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | — | 100.0% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 1 | 1 |
| Update frequency | Fortnightly | Fortnightly |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No — better |
| Monetization | Freemium | Free — better |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 16.4 — better | 26.2 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 165 MB | 54 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Codingmiao PTE. LTD. | Alexander Knue |
Customer experience
Bubuling Nihongo
Hanzi Pen
In-app purchases
Bubuling Nihongo
- Pro (1 Month)$0.991 Month
- Pro (1 Year)7 Days trial$5.991 Year
- Pro (Lifetime)$69.99
Hanzi Pen
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is Bubuling Nihongo free?
Is Hanzi Pen free?
Which has better reviews, Bubuling Nihongo or Hanzi Pen?
Do Bubuling Nihongo or Hanzi Pen have ads?
Which is updated more often, Bubuling Nihongo or Hanzi Pen?
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