vocabulary card method

Welcome to HSK Flashcards. This site is intented to be a one-stop resource for HSK vocabulary lists and flashcards for people studying Mandarin Chinese. To begin studying the flashcards right now, just click the green “study” button on your left.

The entire HSK vocabulary list is available to download in several file formats, including flashcards in PDF format (suitable for printing on Avery business card paper). Recently, I added the Practical Chinese Reader textbook vocabulary lists, as well as the vocabulary lists from the New Practical Chinese Reader.

If you find errors in any of the lists, please email me. If you need the lists in another file format, please email me. If you have a suggestion for the website, please email me. If you're bored, please email me.

Mandarin Chinese is an interesting, useful language! I hope this site helps your exploration and learning!

Hànyǔ Shuǐpíng Kǎoshì: “The Chinese Proficiency Test (HSK) is China's national standardized test...to assess the Chinese language proficiency of non-native speakers”

In 2006, I tried to find a list of the HSK vocabulary so that I could make myself some flashcards. I did find a couple of lists, but they were all incomplete in one way or another, so I merged several of those lists to get something better. The results of that work are available on this site. Many people have contributed since then by sending in the typos, errors and missing words they have found in the lists. Topple recently reviewed all of the words in all four lists, and found several deficiencies. Thanks, Topple!

New Practical Chinese Reader: “NPCR is a new series of textbooks designed for native English speakers to learn Chinese. ... The objective of this series is to develop the student's ability to communicate using Chinese through the study of language structure, language function, and related cultural knowledge along with the training of listening, speaking, reading and writing skills.”

In 2007, I found the Practical Chinese Reader textbook series, and started using that curriculum to better formalize my study. Matti Tukiainen has the vocabulary lists for books 1, 2 and 3 on his website. I've added those lists to this site. The PCR books have been rewritten in a second edition, called the New Practical Chinese Reader. I have digitized NPCR books 1, 2 and 3. Topple recently offered his help by digitizing NPCR books 4 and 5 (well, book 5 will be here soon).

— Jake Marble, 马杰克

Anki is a program designed to help you remember facts (such as words and phrases in a foreign language) as easily, quickly and efficiently as possible. To do this, it tracks how well you remember each fact, and uses that information to optimally schedule review times. With a minimal amount of effort, you can greatly increase the amount of material you remember, making study more productive, and more fun.

Anki is based on a theory called spaced repetition. In simple terms, it means that each time you review some material, you should wait longer than last time before reviewing it again. This maximizes the time spent studying difficult material and minimizes the time spent reviewing things you already know. The concept is simple, but the vast majority of memory trainers and flashcard programs out there either avoid the concept all together, or implement inflexible and suboptimal methods that were originally designed for pen and paper.

While Anki can be used for studying anything, it also ships with special features designed to make studying Japanese and English easier: integrated dictionary lookups, missing kanji reports, and more. Sample decks are also provided for Russian.

Anki's scheduling algorithm is based on the proven SM2 SuperMemo algorithm. It improves upon the basic SM2 algorithm by adding features like priorities and a revision queue sorted in order of priority.