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We made a free site for German vocabulary: spaced repetition + a train game. Feedback welcome (vokabahn.com)
submitted 3 weeks ago by to c/german@lemmy.world
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Hi all! We built Vokabahn, a free German vocabulary site, and would love honest feedback from people learning German.

  • Study: 15,000 words from A1 to C2, ordered by how often they're used. Each card has native-sounding audio, the article and plural, and a real example sentence with translation. Spaced repetition brings words back right before you'd forget them, with a daily goal and a streak.
  • Vokabahn Express: a 3D train ride across Germany. A German word appears on your train and you switch onto the track with its meaning: https://vokabahn.com/game/vokabahn-express

It's free and stays free, no account needed (Google sign-in only syncs progress between devices). We made it, so criticism is very welcome, especially about the word choices and translations.

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[–] 2 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (4 children)

What's the source for the data (ranking, definitions, parts of speech, examples, audio fragments, A1–C2 categorisation, ...)?

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  • [–] 2 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (3 children)

    Done 90 words now, bit annoyed that none of them were new to me even while I selected progressively higher levels (C2 for the last 15 or so). I definitely don't know the entire dictionary just yet 😅

    And it also just occurred to me that you're missing the gender that you're supposed to learn with the word, else you just end up having to learn everything twice. Which seems like a pretty basic omission 🤔

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  • [–] [S] 1 point 3 weeks ago (2 children)

    Good catch on both: nouns now show der/die/das on every answer, and the wrong answers are as hard as the right one, so C2 is properly C2. Thanks for trying it.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 child)

    Am I correct in assuming that the "we" in the post above is Claude and you, and that that also answers my dodged data source question above?

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  • [–] [S] 1 point 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

    Yes, we use AI tools, Claude and ChatGPT among them, the way a lot of small projects do now. They’re tools, not the authors: a lot of hands-on work has gone into the content, and it keeps being improved. Vokabahn has been in the works for over three months. It started as something to help ourselves and other learners, and grew into a full study mode plus several games.

    The sources aren’t hidden either. They’re on the About page (vokabahn.com/about/legal): English Wiktionary for the meanings and Tatoeba for many of the example sentences, credited under their licences.

    On blocking AI crawlers: it’s a small, newish site, and bots were hitting it with hundreds of thousands of requests. That slows things down for actual learners and costs real money to serve. Search engines are welcome; scrapers and training crawlers aren’t. It’s free to use, and it stays free. (AI still crawls the site and gets all the data it needs from it, but this reduces it)

    Vokabahn isn’t meant to be anyone’s only study material; it’s a helper that makes daily practice fun, especially the games. If someone picks up even a couple of new words, that’s already a win. A few learners have passed 2,000 words each ( Since the 1st of October ) , and honestly, that’s what gives us the motivation, and also the experience of doing something fun for us and hopefully for others.

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    • [–] 2 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 child)

    I just did some words to get today's completion.

    I had the expectation it would be easier words, since I didn't specify a level (nor do I see how), but I was stumped by the word for "severance pay." And that doesn't seem like a word I generally would need in basic, every day conversation.

    The example sentences seem above a basic level, too.

    Edit - I found it. Looks like it defaults to all levels.

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  • [–] [S] 2 points 3 weeks ago

    Thanks a lot for the feedback. You are right, “All levels” mixed in words from every level which is how Abfindung turned up so early. We’ve changed it. New words now start with everyday A1–A2 vocabulary and step up gradually as you learn, with a few slightly harder ones mixed in. You can still choose exact levels under Settings → Levels, on the All words page, and in most of the games.

    About the example sentences: fair point. Some of them are more complex than the word they’re meant to teach, and a few vice versa. We’re working through them, starting with the beginner words. If one stands out as off, send it our way and it goes to the top of the list. Thanks for trying it!

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