How long would it take from N4 to N3?

I just did a mock n4 yesterday and got good marks. I am not a fan of studying by “N” level but I also love passing JLPT (idk why tho).

I have stopped midway through (TangoN4) and only do it when i am unable to mine 10 sentences from immersion which is rare.

My college starts in september so i have 4 months where i can spend 6 hours in learning, (yeah thats my limit).

Heres my current routine:

Anki in morning [15minutes]

(10 sentences mined from immersion) and reviewing previously completed tangoN5.
I used to do 40 tangoN5 and am currently a bit burnt out so i have reduced it to 10 cards a day.

Immersion (anime with jp subs)

(Haven’t actually counted how long but 2-3 episodes with regular pausing and looking up words with yomichan, if theres a sentence in which i dont understand a single word, i just skip it (don’t pause)

My main goal isn’t to pass n1 or being able to converse in japanese. Its just for watching anime without subs and reading LNs)

I read somewhere that vocab for n3 is around 3700? I used japaneseAmmoWithMisa for grammar for N4 along with Miku. (No textbooks)

I am ready to study from CureDolly from now on if its recommended. Also, should i try buying the N3 Try! Grammar book? I am also planning to start reading easy Mangas.

(I’ve heard that we should expect 20 marks less in the actual test compared to mock but i still passed) i started from January2023 and binged all japaneseAmmo’s videos.

Please recommend me some grammar resources.

4 comments
  1. Hi, I’m studying for N4 and I’m doing something like you.
    When I ask for N3 grammar resources, they suggest me to use **Tobira** or **Quartet** and Tokini Andy’s N3 grammar playlist on YouTube.

  2. Each level will take you about 6 months of hard work imo. That’s not a concrete rule, but just how I personally feel. N5 will take the shortest amount of time, n2 and n1 the longest. N3 is medium, so 6 months. Depends on how and how well you study of course.

  3. Roughly around 500-700 hours. Vocabulary is indeed around 3.5k, also ~700 kanji. Words with such kanji will be written in kanji form, so from this point a lot of words will come in 2 forms, pronunciation and how it’s written. But majority of these 500-700 hours are practice, rather than things like SRS.

  4. If I remember the suggested vocab / kanji / grammar lists right, each level is roughly double the content than the last, so take how long it took to get to N4 and double it probably wouldn’t be a bad guess.

    Theoretically it could just take you a few months. There are folks who got the N1 in 12-18 months. But everyone is different and depending on how much time you put in each day will greatly affect how fast you pick things up.

    So thats why I think looking at how long it has taken you so far is probably going to give you the best estimate.

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