kana-dojo
Aesthetic, minimalist platform for learning Japanese inspired by Duolingo and Monkeytype, built with Next.js and sponsored by Vercel. Beginner-friendly with plenty of good first issues - all contributions are welcome!
The Lens
By Erik Loyd, SaaS CEO and former COO/CFO of an AWS Premier Partner.
Updated Mar 2026
Kana Dojo is a minimalist Japanese language learning app inspired by Duolingo, built with Next.js. Covers hiragana, katakana, and vocabulary with spaced repetition. Clean UI, gamified progress tracking, and a focus on the fundamentals that trip up beginners.
Fully free, no ads, no paid tier. Sponsored by Vercel. The codebase is beginner-friendly with labeled good-first-issues, so it doubles as a learning project for Next.js developers.
The catch: Japanese only. No other languages supported, and the curriculum covers kana and basic vocabulary, not grammar or conversation. If you're past the beginner stage, you'll outgrow it quickly. For comprehensive Japanese learning, Anki with community decks goes much deeper.
Free vs Self-Hosted vs Paid
fully freeCompletely free and open source. No paid tiers, no ads.
Free forever with no restrictions.
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Trust Signals
License: GNU Affero General Public License v3.0
Must share source even for SaaS/network use. Strongest copyleft.
Commercial use: ✓ Yes
About
- Owner
- lingdojo (Organization)
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