Easy Hanzi is a flashcard software program designed to help you learn the Chinese language. Available for both Windows and Mac OS X, it is the ideal tool to aid you in your studies.
Learning to read and write Chinese characters requires time and patience. This does not mean it needs to be a chore. Easy Hanzi provides a user-friendly interface with advanced features designed to make each learning session count.
Easy Hanzi lets you work at your own learning pace. Simply practice with the flashcards daily and the software will track your learning sessions. You maybe practice using three types of session - multiple-choice questions, typing or self-assessment.
The software integrates a spaced repetition algorithm designed to help you learn more efficiently. The algorithm works by quizzing you more frequently on difficult flashcards and less frequently on simpler ones. This helps you focus most of your attention on mastering complex Chinese characters in a shorter timeframe.
Easy Hanzi includes thousands of stroke animations, which allows you to practice writing Chinese characters using the correct stroke order.
Moreover, each character is decomposed in its sub-parts to better visualize the structure of a character.
Finally, Easy Hanzi propose two stroke order views - animated strokes, which displays a character being drawn; and stroke decomposition, which shows the whole character in one view.
Easy Hanzi includes a Chinese/English dictionary. It allows searching by simplified or traditional Chinese characters, pinyin or English. The results can be in either simplified or traditional Chinese, or both.
The dictionary detects your input automatically, whether it's English, pinyin or Chinese characters and displays the results accordingly. In the cases where the pinyin and English might overlap (for example, "long" or "you" are both English and pinyin words), the dictionary allows switching from one to the other.
If you search for one Chinese Character, detailed information will appear concerning this character - including its radical, its simplified or traditional variants, and its HSK level. If available, you can also view the character stroke order.
Finally, the dictionary provide example sentences for many Chinese characters and words. Simply move the mouse over some Chinese characters and select 'View example sentences'.
Easy Hanzi also helps you practice your listening skills. Whenever a card is selected, you can click on the Audio icon to listen to it. Likewise, in the dictionary, if you move the mouse over a Chinese character or sentences, you may listen to it.
Easy Hanzi includes several pre-made decks of flashcard to start practising straightaway.
This includes the list of word for HSK Elementary, Intermediate and Advanced (level 1 to 6), the Chinese radicals and several lists of the most common and useful Chinese characters.
All of them are available in both traditional and simplified form.
The software makes it easy to create new decks of flashcards.
In most cases, you simply need to type the simplified or traditional characters and Easy Hanzi is going to complete the pinyin and definition for you. Thus you can quickly add your own word lists and start practising with them.
Easy Hanzi lets you export and import flashcards, so once you have created several flashcard decks, you can easily share them.
You may also print your decks. The flashcards are arranged in a way that is easy to cut with scissors. You can also choose how many flashcards per sheet you want to print.