21 Top Online Japanese Classes For Everyone!
Want to learn Japanese? Although considered as one of the toughest languages to learn, it is undeniably fascinating and poetic. Imagine yourself being able to make Japanese friends, watch Japanese cooking classes, or even read books in Japanese. Wouldn’t that be great? 
That said, there are several online Japanese courses on the internet but not all are the same. Some Japanese courses focus on one thing and lose on another. For instance, concentrating on listening and speaking kanji, while other courses on grammar. So what is your reason for learning Japanese? 
Could it be that traveling to Japan to visit the famous ancient temples or experiencing their iconic culture has been on your bucket list? You could also be planning to work or set up a business in Japan. Whatever the reason, you need to find the right place to get Japanese lessons. 
Some of these online courses are free while others require you to pay to join their classes. This article aims to help you find the right sites to learn Japanese online as well as know the pros, cons, and price for each course.
Online Japanese Classes
Table of Contents
- I Will Teach You a Language
- JapanesePod101
- Pimsleur
- Lingodeer
- Bunpo
- Wasabi
- Imabi
- Human Japanese
- Easy Japanese by NHK World
- BondLingo
- Assimil
- Kanshudo
- Marugoto
- Mango Languages
- Samidori
- Japenese Level Up
- FluentU
- Coto Academy
- Japanese Ammo
- Nihongo – Pro.com
- Loecsen Japanese
1. I Will Teach You a Language
Suited for:
It is suited for both complete beginners and intermediate-level people.
Cost:
The beginner course price is $397 and is automatically billed on day 8 after having gone through a 7-day free trial. You are free to cancel after the 7 day free trial without any obligations.
What we like?
Their Japanese Uncovered course is a detailed 20 classes program that will help you become an intermediate-level speaker of the Japanese language. It completely immerses you from day one by listening to and reading stories carefully crafted for beginners. It gives you access to a wide range of audiobooks, stories, Japanese artwork, and English translations to help you get a better grasp. You get to learn from more than 100 video lessons that teach you pronunciation, grammar, writing, Japanese culture, and vocabulary. It has fully downloadable learning resources and you can do creative tasks and quizzes to help track your progress. Though some learners may feel that the course is intense, it is very useful for learning Japanese.
Visit I Will Teach You a Language
2. JapanesePod101
Suited for:
This learning platform is suited for people at all levels i.e. beginner to advanced levels.
Cost:
The monthly price for the basic, premium, and premium plus plans are $8, $25, and $47 consecutively. Both premium plans have a 7-day free trial and lifetime account offer.
What we like?
This online Japanese course helps you learn to speak from the very first lesson. The teachers slow down to explain every phrase and word as you’re reading, writing, understanding Japanese culture, and grammar. Their Japanese language lessons are specially tailored based on your goals and needs. You will get flashcards that re-examine you to make sure you never forget the words taught. This learning platform also provides slideshows and lists of words to help you learn Japanese. They give you a breakdown for each sentence and a slowed audio to help you get every word spoken. With this online course, you can have your own Japanese tutor who can help you learn how to make a 3-minute conversation within a week. You will also receive personal feedback and corrections via the platform private messenger. You however have to subscribe to their paid packages to unlock some of these features. It’s advisable to try the free 7-day trial to see it fits your needs.
3. Pimsleur
Suited for:
This is a beginner-level course.
Cost:
The price for Level 1-5 of their Japanese course is $230 however you can opt to buy a Pimsleur audio-only CD at a price of $119.95.
What we like?
Pimsleur’s Japanese online course combines the Pimsleur method with learner participation to achieve success. Every lesson blends rhythm, vocabulary, intonation, melody, and grammar to give you a real feel of the language and culture. Each Pimsleur lesson selects sentences, phrases, and words according to your everyday conversations beginning with basic Japanese. They also make sure they don’t engulf you with too many of those words. It has an intuitive reminder of new structures and words at precise intervals to increase your chances of remembrance. This is mostly a self-study platform that can be accessed from your desktop or mobile device and you can share the application with up to three other users. The application teaches you widely used Japanese alphabets including Kanji, hiragana, and katakana.
4. Lingodeer
Suited for:
This platform’s online Japanese courses are most suited for beginners as it teaches the language through fun lessons.
Cost:
You can learn Japanese at the price of; $13.99 / month, $34.99 / quarter, $79.99 / year. You can also make a lifetime purchase for $119.99.
What we like?
LingoDeer offers two Japanese courses namely Japanese 1 and Japanese 2. Both of these teach you basic vocabulary and grammar with a focus to practice speaking Japanese as you build upon it. While many other applications focus on vocabulary, this platform is great for learning grammar. It uses clever strategies to help you learn Japanese faster such as Gamification. Here the Japanese lessons are scheduled in a series of quizzes and engaging games for a more effective learning experience. The lessons are strategically paced based on your advancement by gradually introducing new devices as you hit new milestones. This is to help you have a better hold of natural Japanese speech. Lingodeer provides you with grammar study notes that are easy to understand before starting a new lesson. It is a fairly new language app but is much better than most others and fairly cheaper as well. There are many exercises after completing a lesson starting with easy and ending with harder questions. At Lingodeer anything in Alphabet, flashcards, tests, reviews, and the first unit are granted free of charge.
5. Bunpo
Suited for:
It is best for beginners to intermediate-level speakers.
Cost:
Bunpo is an absolutely free-to-use application on an Android or iOS device.
What we like?
Bunpo is a heavily packed application with lots of content. You can choose to learn a fundamental Kana lesson or cover JLPT from N5 to N1. The application is also excellent for learning hiragana and katakana for a beginner. It has various grammar lessons arranged in cards which you can review or study in order. Each card provides excellent explanations to each grammar point together with example sentences. Are you having difficulty reading the words? You can always opt for the audio mode as well as experience the version in English. At the completion of a flashcard, you immediately get quizzed using questions and multiple choices to choose from. Bunpo claims to have about 8,000 quiz questions and 1,700 sentence examples. It has a built-in Japanese translator/dictionary to better understand Japanese. The free plan is great but you can also get extra features by subscribing to Bunpo Plus which is a paid plan.
6. Wasabi
Suited for:
It is good for beginner to expert levels of speaking Japanese.
Cost:
The wasabi light plan price is $34.49, the basic plan costs $68.99, and the price for the intensive plan is $128.12. You can take a 7-day free course without providing your credit card details.
What we like?
Leaning Japanese online has been simplified by Wasabi’s tutor-student interactive online classes and the free self-study materials it provides. It provides several guides on Japanese grammar, video lessons as well as audio recordings done by graded readers. Believed to be among the top online Japanese courses, Wasabi typically teaches in Japanese but you can always request an English-speaking tutor. It publishes tons of self-study materials therefore you don’t have to subscribe to one of its paid plans. These materials however don’t have quizzes or exercises to test your comprehension. One-on-one lessons with the Japanese teachers helps you understand and speak better in native Japanese. Japanese learners can be sure of tons of materials and support from the tutors as they go through the language courses.
7. Imabi
Suited for:
Imabi will take you from beginner to superior level through its online lessons.
Cost:
This is another excellent free Japanese course with more than 400 lessons covering from beginner to advanced Japanese vocabulary.
What we like?
Imabi website is purely text-based but cannot be used as the only resource even for learning basic Japanese as well as high-level. It does not have any audio lessons to learn with however it has more than 30 classical Japanese lessons. Despite it being a comprehensive platform to learn Japanese online, it only has occasional quizzes. You also benefit from in-depth explanations and lots of examples to better understand the language. The lessons teach the fundamentals of Kanji, how to differentiate it, and how to use it in a word list. It is a well-organized and comprehensive guide to learning Japanese however you need to have a strong understanding of hiragana and katakana before taking on their lessons. It teache