Toku Japanese & Chinese Reader
Darren Nah Education iPhoneiPadiPod touch
Toku Japanese & Chinese Reader is a free Education app for iPhone and iPad by Darren Nah. Rated 5.0/5 from 5 ratings. Requires iOS 17.6.
- Rating
- 5.0
- 5 ratings
- Price
- Free
- on the App Store
- Size
- 841 MB
- Age 17+
- Updated
- Oct 16
- 2026 · v6.13.2
Screenshots
About Toku Japanese & Chinese Reader
Tap any word in real Japanese or Chinese — a podcast, a news article, a novel, a website, your own audio file — and get its reading and its meaning instantly, without leaving the page. The dictionaries live inside the app. Every word is worked out on your device and you never have to sign in, so anything already on your phone can be read and looked up with the plane in the air. Finding podcasts, opening websites and the AI need an internet connection. LISTEN Find shows by search, from the trending charts in Japan, mainland China and Taiwan, or from a hand-picked list for learners. Every episode gets a transcript — either supplied by the show or generated privately on your device — and the current line follows along as you listen. Tap any word and the audio pauses so you can read its meaning; press play and it picks up where you left off. Shadowing mode loops a sentence so you can repeat after the speaker, and you can record yourself to compare. READ ANYTHING Browse Japanese and Chinese websites with furigana or pinyin added in place. Paste a link and get the clean article without the clutter. Import your own EPUB, PDF, text, or subtitle files. Scan a printed page with the camera. Books are laid out like books, with proper Japanese and Chinese line-breaking and real chapters. TAP TO UNDERSTAND Two purpose-built engines — one Japanese, one Chinese — work out how each word is actually read in the sentence in front of you, not just what a dictionary lists. Japanese gets furigana, pitch accent, and conjugation breakdowns. Chinese gets pinyin with tone changes applied. Traditional characters are a first-class choice throughout, not an afterthought. LOOK ANYTHING UP Search from Japanese, Chinese, or English. Draw a character you can't type. See stroke-order animations, radical breakdowns, word frequency, and example sentences from real usage. REMEMBER IT Save a word and it keeps the sentence you first met it in, and where it came from, so you can jump straight back. Spaced repetition returns it just before you'd forget. A home-screen and lock-screen widget keeps a word in front of you, and an optional once-a-day reminder tells you when reviews are ready. Export to Anki at any time. ON IPHONE AND IPAD Toku Reader is built for both. On iPad the transcript, the reader, the dictionary and your word list use the full screen rather than a stretched phone layout. OFFLINE, AND NO ACCOUNT The dictionaries ship inside the app and every word is worked out on your device, with no internet connection. You never have to sign in. Your library is copied to your own iCloud so it follows you between your iPhone and iPad, and you can switch that off, and delete the copy, in Settings. Beyond that, text leaves your device only when you send it: a sentence you ask the AI about (only after you switch that feature on), a problem report you choose to send, or a podcast or video search. WHAT'S FREE Listening, reading, browsing, shadowing, and reviewing are free and unlimited. Word lookups are free up to 15 a day. Toku Premium removes that limit, monthly or yearly. Payment is charged to your Apple ID at confirmation of purchase. Subscriptions renew automatically unless cancelled at least 24 hours before the end of the current period; manage or cancel any time in Settings → Subscriptions. Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Ratings & reviews
5.0
5 ratings
What’s new
Version 6.13.2 · Updated October 16, 2026
Reading. The small readings over long numbers stay over their own number, never off the screen or on top of the next word. Reading. An English text with one Japanese name in it now opens as English, and its English words answer. Dictionary. A word found only in a language you are not learning now says so, instead of showing an empty page. Reading. When you finish a text, only texts in the languages you are learning are suggested next. Reading. A few Japanese words now read right: 十分 as "ten minutes" when it means minutes, and かれ as "he".
App privacy
The developer, Darren Nah, reported these privacy practices to Apple.
Data Linked to You
The following data, which may be collected and linked to your identity, may be used for the following purposes:
- Contact Info: Email Address, Name
- Identifiers: User ID
Used for: App Functionality
Data Not Linked to You
The following data, which may be collected but is not linked to your identity, may be used for the following purposes:
- Usage Data: Product Interaction
- User Content: Other User Content
- Identifiers: Device ID
- Diagnostics: Crash Data, Performance Data
Used for: Analytics, App Functionality
Alternatives to Toku Japanese & Chinese Reader
Looking for apps like Toku Japanese & Chinese Reader? Here are 6 similar apps on the App Store. The highest rated is MaruReader: Read in Japanese (5.0/5), and all 6 are free to download.
-
MaruReader: Read in Japanese
5.0
-
Furigana Lens
5.0
-
Shima Bird - Japanese Learning
4.9
-
HelloStory: Japanese Stories
5.0
-
Kakehashi - For WaniKani
5.0
-
Yomikiri
5.0
| App | Rating | Price | Last updated | Compare |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Toku Japanese & Chinese Reader | 5.0 / 5 (5 ratings) | Free | October 16, 2026 | |
| MaruReader: Read in Japanese | 5.0 / 5 (5) | Free | Sep 15, 2026 | Compare |
| Furigana Lens | 5.0 / 5 (6) | Free | Apr 23, 2026 | Compare |
| Shima Bird - Japanese Learning | 4.9 / 5 (16) | Free | Oct 15, 2026 | Compare |
| HelloStory: Japanese Stories | 5.0 / 5 (9) | Free | Dec 2, 2025 | Compare |
| Kakehashi - For WaniKani | 5.0 / 5 (87) | Free | Oct 11, 2026 | Compare |
| Yomikiri | 5.0 / 5 (13) | Free | Jan 21, 2025 | Compare |