Recommendations for good Japanese dictionaries for learners?

Hi all, I apologize if something like this has already been asked, but figured this would be a good place to ask.

I’m trying to learn some Japanese (self-study, still a beginner, but I aspire to pass the N2 exam someday). I’m looking for a good learners’ kanji dictionary, in English, printed on paper (I’m old school) and would welcome any suggestions.

Here are the things I would like in my ideal dictionary, in rough descending order of importance to me (even just having 3-4 of these would be great):

1) It is easy to look up kanji whose pronunciation I don’t know. (I.e. they are organized in some sensible manner: by radical, by stroke count, or in some other way by which I can visually search for them).

2) It gives both on’yomi and kun’yomi readings for each character, and \*indicates which reading is which.\* (I have studied some Chinese and this would be very useful to make connections with characters I’ve already studied.)

3) Includes, at least, the 2,136 Jōyō kanji.

4) Gives some indication of how to use the kanji in context, or example sentences.

5) Indicates how to write the kanji: at a minimum, it gives the stroke order, and even better if it shows handwritten cursive variants.

6) Indicates on which syllable (if any) the stress falls for the words formed by the kanji, at least in the current standard Tokyo dialect, and if a verb is unstressed or carries an accent on the second-to-last syllable in its conjugated forms. (For some reason it is almost impossible to find any book or dictionary which gives this information.)

7) Bonus points if it also includes some etymological information on the kanji and/or the words it forms.

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Maybe I am asking for too much from a learners’ dictionary, but it would be nice to know if something satisfying most of these criteria actually exists. I’ve looked in local libraries and bookstores without much luck, hence I’m asking here.

2 comments
  1. For the specifics you’re looking for it might be better to just improve in Japanese and then buy an actual Japanese dictionary in Japanese. They use a lot of simple ones in elementary school that explain things pretty simply and in depth, and I don’t think you’d need too high of a level to understand them. Might not be a bad idea to start with.

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