How should I start learning Kanji?

Okay. So three days ago I decided to take the plunge into learning Japanese. I have a few reasons / dreams for this, and I have just finished Hiragana (only took me 3 days).

By far the biggest obstacle in learning Japanese is the Kanji. I have read that if you wanted to be able to read a Japanese newspaper / Manga, you would need to know at least 2,000 Kanji. To add to that, I read that each Kanji can have up to 8 different ways to pronounce, and 1-3 different meanings. This sounds extremely daunting to me, but I figure "If I don't start somewhere, I won't get anywhere". That is the main issue I am having right now, finding out where to start and how to start.

I have read articles on Tofugu about the proper way of learning Kanji, and how the traditional way that the children in Japan learn is not the ideal way for a foreigner. Tofugu recommended that any beginner should learn about "radicals" as they are the "building blocks" of Kanji. I understand the logic behind these articles, and honestly agree(then again, what do I know?).

Ideally, I would like to learn Kanji without having to pay anything. This may not be possible, but if anyone has any suggestions on where to start for someone who just finished Hiragana (I wouldn't say I am finished Hiragana, of course I have to review it to keep it fresh in my mind), it would be appreciated!

I am currently taking the "trial" courses of WaniKani and Textfugu, but I know eventually I will have to pay to get the entire course. I should also mentioned I have access to Anki, and plan to use it during my study.

Is there any "courses" that are free on the web? What is your opinion on the best way to learn Kanji? Any tips for a beginner like me?

P.S I was unsure if this was the best category for this question. If this is more suited to another subforum, it would be appreciated if a mod could move it for me. Thanks!

Learn it in the same order as school-kids does on Japan. On Wikipedia (and other sites) you can found more information about it.

Edit: Here.

Too learn kanji, you must play as him and go more in depth into his backstory.

I can give you some tips, I've been learning Japanese for 6ish years now and currently studying the language at uni.

But I'd like to ask, have you not learned Katakana?

Still learning. I can't write kanji.

Jishop's software and http://jisho.org/kanji/radicals/ are very helpful. [quote="yurixhentai"]But I'd like to ask, have you not learned Katakana?[/quote] It should take the same ammount as learning Hiragana.

I decided at some point that what was important for me with kanji is being able to read it, not write it. So I can only write a few but I'm able to read most in common use. I accomplished this by reading visual novels using ith and translation aggrevator. I would recommend it, but you need the basic iunno genki 1 and 2 completed first so you understand what is going on grammatically.

You could also try learning them using radical and mnemomics. I did this before starting the above method and it kinda works.. but I think it's far more important to see them in actual use in order to pick up their readers rather than just memorizing each individually via their radicals. If you want to be able to write them though, you kind of have to go this way.

As you're just starting out though, I would say go learn a fair bit of grammer first. Then come back and try the above methods.

I don't know if this will help you with Kanji specifically, but Rosetta Stone seems to be a successful way to learn a language with its immersion technique. (you can always pirate it)

I have to learn 25 a week...

.....not so much with nonromantic languages that don't use a standard roman alphabet. Learning by characters uses chunking instead, which is a different learning process. Maybe for minor applications in speaking, at least what I got from the Mandarin series, but there's a lack of variability.

Learning Kanji is basically the same as learning traditional Chinese and hybridizing it with the two other Japanese alphabets. And even if you do know things like Hirigana, you still need to learn it as in through application and usage. I'd personally stick with practicing with hirigana and writing full sentences before moving to kanji. And the truth is there are different ways and portions to learn in languages, are you learning to speak, read, or write?

I have not learned Katakana yet, but I am probably going to learn it before I start Kanji.

Will it take as long to learn Katakana as it did Hiragana? Or is Katakana harder?

Should I learn Japanese Grammar before I start Kanji? Or learn both at the same time?

Will it take 6 years to get anywhere close to mastery? If possible, I would like to be able to read Visual Novels in 1-2 years. Once I get to a stage that I can read, I will be able to kick off from there. It was the same with Hiragana. Once I memorized all the Kana, it was just a matter of actually reading things to build up speed(I still don't know what half the words I am reading mean...that's a whole other issue).

Thank you for the replies guys(and gals). As of now my plan is:

1. Learn Katakana.
2. Learn Japanese Grammar.
3. Start learning the Kanji radicals (I was recommended this by various sources, including Tofugu).
4. During my Kanji studies, I will have to learn different Japanese words and their meanings. Learning to read is useless unless you know what you're reading actually means (which is my current issue with Hiragana).
5. Once at a stage that I can actually read and understand stuff, I will just spend countless hours reading Manga / Visual Novels with a Japanese dictionary / translator by my side in-case I run into Kanji that I do not know.

My main techniques currently planned for learning Kanji will be Radicals and Anki. However, I need other sources (maybe a free online guide?). I personally LOVE Anki. It makes memorizing a lot easier for me, and that is what learning the Japanese Language is all about, memorizing, right?

I want to point out that I won't be focusing too much on learning how to write Kanji. I feel that is far less important than learning to read Kanji and understand Kanji. Maybe after mastering how to read, I will then focus on learning to write it, but for now it is at the bottom of my priorities.

Definitely learn Katakana before Kanji. Make sure you have a solid and confident knowledge of Kana before starting to tackle Kanji. By that I mean being able to look at a character and recognise and pronounce it without hesitation.

I wouldn't say Katakana is harder than Hiragana in terms of writing. The shapes are much more simple. Memorising them shouldn't be too difficult, but might take a bit longer since you already have the knowledge of Hiragana and are piling more on top of that. But it's pretty simple. The only ones I struggled with at the start were シ,ツ,ン and ソ since they look so similar. I would say the only difficulty would be figuring out what a word means when written in Katakana; some are really obvious and some are much harder to figure out. There are even loan words from English that have a completely different meaning in Japanese. But I wouldn't worry about that at this stage, it's just for grounding knowledge. Focus on learning how to write them for now. And make sure you're writing them over and over and over again by hand. After you are mostly confident with writing them, use this website for reading practice. Pick each row of Kana you want to be tested on and then hit 'Practice'.

As for grammar, you should definitely have some basic grammar knowledge before learning Kanji, such as knowing how tenses and verb conjugation works. You don't need to know Kanji for that, but you can apply Kanji to it afterwards. You don't need to go too deep into grammar straight away, but it will be good writing and reading practice for you. I don't know how much Japanese you know, but it's good to have some basic knowledge. For example, 食べる (たべる）"To eat". It would be good to know how to say "I ate" （たべた）, "I won't eat" （たべない） eat. Japanese verb conjugation is really easy to pick up, you'll see what I mean when you start learning.

In addition, learn some basic phrases first (and how to write them), like how to introduce yourself, greetings, some basic sentences e.g. using the example above, learning how to say "I ate [something]". Once you have some basic knowledge of how the language works, then I'd say move onto Kanji. Learning Kanji will forever be an ongoing process. You will need to discipline yourself and practice every day and review new Kanji often or you will forget quickly. And make sure you're learning by writing. Moreover, read lots. Even if you don't know words, it doesn't matter, skip over them for now, you'll learn them eventually. That, or you could do close reading and look up each word. It depends what is best for you as an individual. But reading is important because: you learn how the structures of the language work, you pick up words, you reinforce your knowledge of a Kanji you have learnt when you see it etc.

With regards to time, it depends how much time you put in every day. I've been learning this long and I'm learning new stuff all the time, though I'm at "pre-advanced" now so it's getting pretty difficult. For example, the exam for one of my modules will be translation of poetry from texts like the Kokinshū and prose from stories like Taketori Monogatari.

I can't say how long it would take to read a visual novel as it really depends on what kind it is.

If you want recommendations for learning resources/learning methods and stuff then let me know. Same for if I didn't cover anything or you want to ask anything else!

Edit:
>lel Tofugu

Watching anime is the best way, ignore yuri, he's been fooled from the start desu.

Learning katakana shouldn't take you longer than what you spent learning hiragana. And you never stop learning kanji.

Quick little tip for anyone else who struggles with ツ、シ. The shape/stroke direction sort of matches with the hiragana counterpart. This is the way I was taught and I find it easy to remember.

The first two strokes of シ are a little bit more vertically aligned than tsu and you write them in the same order/direction as you write し. Finally the upward stroke (last) sort of matches the end of し.

Similarly the stroke order in ツ matches the direction that you write つ and the last stroke in ツ matches the downward stroke in つ.

Terrible explanation but maybe someone will find this useful.

Go buy one of those books they give kids to learn the basic 1000 then 2000 ones, but I doubt an English speaker will learn fast, especially if you are an adult. It is easier to learn languages if you are younger. The older you are, the more you are neutralized in your standard language. Also, try placing a image to your kanji. It helps when learning words so you don't have to think of the english word for it.

I understood it. Pretty helpful since I was having trouble with them. As for So and n, I'll just have to memorize the stroke order and position.

Edit: Aside from Kanji, I found a neat game to keep Hiragana and Katakana fresh in your mind. Its pretty addictive and doesn't really feel like you're studying: KanaCrush. My best score was 196, I'm shooting for 500.