Does anyone use these electronic dictionaries? Is it possible to practice writing kanji on them as this picture suggests? Or is it just for searching kanji.

16 comments

1. yes one of my friends in college from japan did

   for the second , yes and no
   you’ll be practicing writing if the dictionary doesn’t recognize it lmao

2. If you want to practice writing kanji (and don’t want to do it the old fashioned way with pen and paper) you might want to check out the app Kanji Tree.

3. I have an e-dictionary, but mine’s a Casio EX-Word. I can use it to write, but it shines with the amount of reference material it has already loaded on it.

   I can write on mine, but it’s meant more for reading and studying than writing. I use apps to practice writing kanji.

4. There’s lots of apps for writing practice. Here’s the one I use..

   [Apple](https://apps.apple.com/us/app/learn-japanese-kanji/id1078107994)

   [Android](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.lulilanguages.j5KjAnd&hl=en_US&gl=US)

5. That’s not for practice, it’s for looking them up.

   Anyway, I have a much older Ex-Word. I guess probably fewer people buy these now, but the advantage is they come loaded up with lots of specialized dictionaries that are useful if you get further in your studies.

6. It’s not for practicing. When you’re seeing a kanji and don’t know how to pronounce it, you can just write it down and look up.

   Anyways, although these electronic dictionaries used to be popular like 10-20 years ago, now you can use a smartphone and dictionary apps instead. I believe there are apps for writing practice too, aren’t they?

7. Electronic dictionaries like this are popular in Japan because Japan is full of old people who don’t know how to use smartphones.

8. I don’t really see that working, like yes you can technically write kanjis but it’s not very practical and everytime you’ll write a kanji it’s going to give you all the info etc so it would be very time consuming and not very efficient I think.

9. I used one many years ago. But I also had a kanji game on my ds lite which was great for practicing.

10. The electronic dictionaries in Japan are pretty awesome, but I’m not sure if any are particularly made for writing practice.

11. I use a Casio Ex Word and love it. You can’t use it to practice writing kanji. The manual input is for searching for kanji you don’t know the pronunciation of. Some basic knowledge of stroke order is required otherwise you won’t be able to find the kanji you need.
    I highly recommend getting an electronic dictionary but only once you have a grasp of beginner Japanese as the menus are in Japanese.

12. You can printout papers that help you write Kanji, like this: http://www.humanjapanese.com/downloads/kanji_writing_practice_sheet.pdf

    Or simply just loose leaf is fine.

13. I have several of these, mostly Casios. The Rolls-Royce of electronic dictionaries in my opinion is the EX-Word DATAPLUS 5 XD-A10000. It has a 和英大辞典, an 英和大辞典, the 広辞苑, the 漢語林, and a 国語大辞典. Lots of times I run into words that aren’t on Weblio or ALC that have multiple entries in the XD-A10000. Most electronic dictionaries and mobile apps only give you a 中辞典 to work with. Plus, the XD-A10000 on Yahoo! Auctions generally only costs about 6000 yen because it’s a 10 year old model. They’re very useful, even today.

    EDIT: They’re for looking up words and kanji, not for writing practice.

14. I remember those from years ago, they are not for practicing, only for looking up kanji when you do not know the reading. I don’t think anyone uses them anymore with smartphone apps being able to do the same. But I remember when I went to language school in the year 2010, all the Taiwanese and Koreans had them. They slowly fell out of fashion when I went again in 2014 and 2016, so I suspect now in 2022, even less people if anyone are using them. There are plenty of kanji practice apps on the app store. I have a Japanese apple account and have quite a few kanji apps and also kanji kentei and kanji practice apps. I search for kanji by drawing it out on one of these apps. But even on the UK/US stores, the kanji and japanese dictionaries allow you to search kanji by drawing it out, you must get the stroke order correct or it won’t work.

    For just practice, the best way to practice writing kanji is pen and paper imo, that’s what I did when I first started learning japanese many years ago.

15. i use my android phone. install google handwriting keyboard and japanese language, use any japanese dictionary (i use takoboto). you can click into the search field and draw your words.

    if on iphone i recommend the midori app.

16. What devices you have? For iPhone there are some app la about japanese that allow you to draw characters