What is it?
Todaii Easy Chinese is an excellent all-rounder for anyone wanting to up their game in Mandarin Chinese reading skills. You can read several articles per day on the free version, plus the app has lots of different, useful features. There are easy and difficult sections covering all types of topics. You can filter based on the article source (most come through from Chinese sources for anyone who’s curious about Chinese general affairs) or based on the topic (there is a huge list of different ones!).
Not only does each article underline vocabulary from different HSK levels – see ‘How to use it below’ – but also you can press and hold characters on the article for their translation in English or any other language. This saves you a lot of time and energy, as you don’t need to move between different apps/platforms to look up vocabulary. The vocabulary comes through from the app’s dictionary section, which is relatively comprehensive. On another point, for anyone looking for an app that provides stroke order for ALL characters free of charge, this app’s dictionary section is the one!
5 reasons why I love it
- Characters in the text are underlined in the relevant HSK level colour. On the homepage, you can choose an article according to the amount of HSK level vocabulary it covers (see image below for clearer understanding). In the article, these colours help to see whether you should recognise a certain character or not…
- You can read along with the audio. This is a brilliant tool if your pronunciation needs some work.
- You can choose to hide/show pinyin and zhuyin. The pinyin and zhuyin options can be great if you are just starting out with Chinese. For those who have a higher level of Chinese, you can hide both and just have the Chinese text.
- Traditional and simplified characters are both available. You choose which suits you!
- You can build your own notebook of characters. I personally really like this feature, as it allows you to build your own vocab lists based on challenging vocab in an article. This notebook feature also allows you to share your personalised vocab list in text format, meaning you can collate vocab lists across various platforms.
How to use it
Find it on the app store. You do not need to create an account or provide any details to start using it.
On the homepage, each text has a multicoloured bar underneath it (see image above), which depicts the amount of each level of vocabulary. HSK 1 is depicted in purple, HSK 2 in blue, HSK 3 in green, HSK 4 in yellow, HSK 5 in orange and HSK 6 in red. This is a great feature as you can choose the correct article for your reading level.
I would say you need to be reading a few articles a day (and creating your own vocabulary list) to make good progress with your Chinese reading skills. Make it a regular habit, opening the app at the same time every day to incorporate a few articles into your language learning routine.
You get 10 free articles a day which I think is more than enough to make good progress. The paid version costs €8.49 for three months, €16 for a year or €29 for a lifetime subscription, which removes all ads, allows you to read offline, download audio offline, look up in the dictionary offline and can be used across several platforms. I personally have not found the ads too bothersome and think the free version is sufficient to be able to improve Mandarin Chinese reading skills quickly.
Who is it for?
This app is better for people with a solid foundation in Chinese, rather than total beginners. That is because even though the articles are relatively short, the vocabulary used and sentence structures can be a little complex. It is a great resource to develop skills to eventually move on to reading full, authentic, news articles in Chinese.
If you’re just starting out in Chinese, check out my recommendations for beginners’ resources.