Flashfriend and Quizlet
Quizlet is great for studying a set before a test. For a language you want to keep for years, here's how Flashfriend compares.
Type in a list of words, or find one of the millions of sets other people have made, and Quizlet has you studying it straight away, with flashcards, games and quizzes. For learning a word list before a class test, it’s hard to beat.
Learning a language is a longer job. You need thousands of words, the grammar that joins them into sentences, and a way to keep all of it long after the test.
What Quizlet does well
- Making a set is quick. Type terms and definitions, or import a list, and you’re done.
- Huge library. Millions of shared sets, many matched to textbooks and courses.
- Ways to study. Flashcards, Learn, matching games and practice tests.
- Classrooms. Teachers can share sets with a whole class.
Its free plan has ads, and limits Learn and practice tests. The paid plan, Quizlet Plus, lifts those limits.
Where Flashfriend is different
Quizlet’s study modes are built around a set: you work through it until you know it. Remembering a word for the long term takes spaced reviews: you’re tested on each word just before you’d forget it, at gaps that grow from days to months. That’s the best-supported finding in learning science (Cepeda et al., 2006), and it’s how Flashfriend schedules every card, using FSRS, the same algorithm Anki uses.
Flashfriend also does the parts a set leaves to you:
- It picks your words. The most frequently used words of the language, most useful first, so you don’t need to find or build sets.
- It helps you make each word memorable. You pick a place you know and a scene from a phrase that sounds like the word, and Flashfriend paints the picture. A picture that relates to you, and that you chose, is far easier to recall (Symons & Johnson, 1997; Slamecka & Graf, 1978). See memory hooks.
- It shows what slips. Each Mandarin tone and each Spanish el or la is a colour in the picture. Japanese words have furigana over the kanji.
- Sentences and grammar. Once you know enough words, you read sentences built from them with one new word each, and grammar arrives one pattern at a time in sentences you can already read. See sentence cards.
- Listening and speaking. Every word and sentence has audio, and with Pro you can practise conversations with Claude or ChatGPT, by text or voice, using your words.
Side by side
| Quizlet | Flashfriend | |
|---|---|---|
| Best at | Studying a set before a test | Learning a language to keep: words, sentences and grammar |
| Price | Free with ads and limits; Quizlet Plus removes them | 14 days free, then a monthly or yearly plan |
| What you can learn | Anything | Mandarin, Japanese and Spanish so far |
| Where the words come from | Your own sets, or shared ones | Most useful words first, chosen for you |
| Review schedule | Study a set until you know it | Tested on each word just before you’d forget it (FSRS) |
| Pictures | Add your own, or from Quizlet’s images | A picture for every word, made from your idea |
| Memory hooks | Write your own | A sound-alike phrase drawn into the picture |
| Tones and genders | Not built in | In colour on every card |
| Sentences and grammar | Whatever the set contains | Sentences with one new word, grammar one pattern at a time |
| Audio | Text-to-speech on many sets | Every word and sentence |
Moving from Quizlet
Flashfriend doesn’t import Quizlet sets. Most Quizlet language sets are lists of common words, and Flashfriend already teaches those, in order of usefulness. If you’ve been using Anki as well, you can bring your Anki deck with its whole review history.
Read more about Flashfriend for Mandarin, Japanese or Spanish, or see how it compares with Anki.
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