#(of course it's all nice and proper in like actual korean romanization systems like the revised one BUT kpop notably does NOT use the

[leatherbookmark]

And What If I Told You. There's No 'W' Sound In 'Wooyoung'

[intheirlanguage]

DROPS: An Honest Review

(If you don’t have time to read everything, I’ve highlighted the important stuff in bold, just read bolded words for a quick overview of my review.)

So I’m here to talk to you about Drops, a semi-recent language learning app available for free on iOS mobile devices. And no, I’m not being paid or anything, I’ve just been messing around with it for a couple weeks now and I thought it would be useful to share my own personal experience and opinion of the app.

So, Drops is really specifically a vocabulary builder, so don’t show up expecting grammar. You will get verbs, though so far they’ve all been conjugated in first person. It sorts the vocabulary by topics, however the app itself is cumulative, so say for example I go to study essentials, it will primarily focus on the vocab of that lesson, however I may still get the occasional vocab word from any other lesson I’ve studied, and of course, only the specific words I’ve been introduced to from each lesson.

You start out with everything but the first category unlocked, when you first open it it asks if you’re a beginner or intermediate, I have no clue what happens if you click intermediate, honestly. When you’re on the categories screen (above), the clock is always stopped. And when you click a lesson and study for like three minutes but then want to go to another lesson for the last two minutes the clock will always stop on the category screen and you can think about what else you want to study without a deadline creeping up on you.

Drops also requires no typing (but that doesn’t mean no spelling, you get it other ways), and, as I’m currently using Japanese, I think it does a fairly decent job at introducing you to non-latin writing systems; however, it should absolutely be supplemented with other resources for learning the script. It phases you in slowly and uses a lot of romanizations, but after a word has come across your screen a couple of times it’ll start asking you to spell it in the proper alphabet. At first it’ll split the word up into like two big parts and eventually you’ll be down to putting it down by syllables or even letters. The groupings it chooses are sometimes random and a bit confusing to put together, even if you know the word, which I dislike. Also know, romanizations can be turned off at any time in the settings menu. Which I haven’t done yet so I don’t know what it’s gonna look like when I do but know that it’s an option.

The pronunciation audio I think is really good. For Japanese I’m pretty sure it’s a native speaker and not like a robot or some random British guy who knows IPA. The audio repetition is constant, so if you fill in the solution you will hear the word spoken each and every time, no exceptions. There is also no heart loosing features of any kind so wrong answers will not get penalized in any way. But when you get one wrong they will repeat the correct answer for you right after.

I also think it has compelling imagery. Everything is in the form of icons (not pictures), so it’s really clear EXACTLY what it’s supposed to be. Several of them, particularly for verbs, even have small animations. Like the one for “I eat” is a guy sitting at the table and his arm moves back and forth between the plate and his mouth, so, like eating. So very simple overall. And if you ever forget what a particular icon is supposed to be, you can always tap and drag/hold and the English will pop up. Here’s one of my favorite icons.

So overall I think it’s a cute little app. It will advertise constantly trying to get you to buy a subscription, I honestly don’t think it would be worth it unless they literally had the deal of the century and you’re rich. Also timing wise 5 minutes goes by incredibly fast but for me rarely feels like it wasn’t enough. I really like the ability to choose categories and not be locked into it until I finish lest the owl get angry (*cough cough* duolingo), so there’s a lot of freedom of movement in that, and the more categories you unlock the more versatility you get. You’re also not required to so all 5 minutes in one go. So if you only want to go for three, you totally can. My biggest complaint is that their like “5 minutes each day” is set for like a day to mean 10 hours, not 24, so sticking with any kind of streak is basically impossible. So, yeah, don’t like that. The absolute best feature they have though, is that when you finish your 5 minutes you get like a waiting screen with a timer until you can play again and a list of every word you encountered in your last 5 minute session. This page forgoes romanizations, and if you tap on an icon you can hear the word pronounced and see the English. Super useful so you can review after the lesson without wasting precious seconds writing vocab down while the timer is going. The notification is a bit guilt-trippy, just a warning.

BEST USES: Overall I think this app works really well as a fun little vocabulary builder. The fact that it mixes in vocab from other lessons (including lessons after the category you’re on and not just before) is extremely helpful and not something I’ve seen in any other app. Also the vocab list feature is mad supreme so love that, also haven’t seen anyone else do it. As it offers little in the sense of grammar or culture, it obvs cannot (and should not) be used as any kind of stand alone language learning method.

I also particularly think that this app would be super useful to people having trouble studying either because they’re super busy, or because they have depression, anxiety, or any other illness that makes simple things for neurotypicals or otherwise able people suddenly way more difficult to accomplish. It’s so low-key, and it only asks for 5 minutes that you don’t even have to give it all in one go, that it’s a nice way to keep language fresh in your brain and still get some extra vocab in when you just can’t bring yourself to do any kind of proper sit down studying.

Drops is currently available in Spanish, Japanese, Chinese, Korean, French, German, Russian, Portuguese or Italian. But as Japanese, Chinese, and Korean are actually pretty recent additions, they will hopefully continue expanding into more languages.