Are these the best Anki decks for learning German? – Deckmill Review
Hallo, Deutschlerner! Today I’m excited to share with you a website that can help you learn practical example sentences and expand your vocabulary exponentially! Today I’m talking about Deckmill !
If you are really wanting to put your German learning on track, consider joining Herr Antrim’s Deutschlerner Club! For just $14.99 per month you will get access to his full A1 and A2 courses plus new materials as he creates them. You will go from knowing zero German to being able to have a short conversation in a short few weeks. Before you know it, you will be conversational in German on a variety of important topics, all while mastering German grammar.
How Herr Antrim found Deckmill
A couple of months ago one of the co-founders of Deckmill contacted me to see if I would be interested in a partnership. As I always do with this kind of partnership, I took a look at the company and what they have to offer language learners before responding. After a quick first look, I was convinced that this is a fantastic opportunity for German learners and language learners in general.
What is Deckmill?
So what is Deckmill ? Deckmill is a flash card curator. They charge a single one-time fee of €14.99 to access flash cards with full sentences in eight languages. You can get 20% off of this price by using the promotional code HERRANTRIM when you checkout. There are also sample cards in all of the levels, so you can try them before you buy them.
There are 3000 flash cards in each language. The cards are split into three levels: beginner , intermediate and advanced. Each flash card comes with audio readings of the sentences at full speed and half speed.
How to Use Deckmill’s Flash Cards
To use Deckmill’s cards, simply create an account, purchase the decks and download the ones you want. Then you can import the flash cards into whichever version of Anki you would like.
Deckmill flash cards run on the Anki platform. If you aren’t familiar with Anki, you should definitely check it out, regardless of whether or not you use Deckmill’s cards. Anki is simply fantastic for language learners.
Anki is a flash card platform that works on Android and computers. There is an iOS version, but unlike all of the other versions of Anki, the iOS version is $24.99, which is stupid expensive for a flash card app, especially when you could simply use a web browser on iOS and go to ankiweb.net to use it for free. Oh, right. There is a web browser version, which is mobile optimized, so you can literally use Anki on anything that has an internet connection.
How Anki Works
Anki uses a system called “spaced repetition” to help you retain as much vocabulary as possible while making sure you don’t lose old vocabulary. You click a button based on how difficult it was for you to remember how to say the phrase on the card. Then, based on that response, Anki decides when to show you that card again.
If you didn’t remember it at all, Anki will show it to you in a minute. If you recognized it, but couldn’t say it, it comes back in 10 minutes. If you could remember it well, but not perfectly, the card will go away for a day. If you knew it perfectly, the card will be snoozed for 4 days. You can also adjust these intervals via the settings in the app.
The more you use Anki the better it will get at showing you the cards you need to review most. Since you get 3000 cards from Deckmill , you will have plenty to keep you busy for a really long time.
What’s so great about Deckmill’s flash cards?
One of my favorite things about Deckmill’s flash cards is that they aren’t just gibberish. You’ll never come across a sentence that says something like “The loch ness monster is drinking whiskey.” or “I do not hear you because I have cinnamon rolls in my ears.” The sentences from Deckmill are practical, everyday example sentences that you might actually need to use in a real German conversation.
In addition to being actually useful, the flash cards come with high quality audio. No robotic voices. No automatically generated voice over. Just good quality pronunciation help.
Example Sentences from Deckmill
How would I recommend you use Deckmill’s cards?
I would start with the beginner list. Look at the English phrase and see if you can take a guess at how you would say it in German. Listen to the audio as you read the actual sentence in German. Repeat the sentence to yourself. Listen to the audio again. Repeat it to yourself again. Then move on to the next card. Do this for each of the 20 cards for the day. Keep doing this until you have memorized all of the cards for beginners. Then switch to the intermediate cards.
The Bad Side of Deckmill
Of course this wouldn’t be a review without a few complaints. The main downside that I see to Deckmill is that there are 3000 cards and only three categories into which they are separated. This means that you might get overwhelmed by the sheer amount of content that you have in front of you.
I would prefer that the cards were separated further after the initial “beginner, intermediate and advanced” levels. There should be some sort of separation. Maybe 100 in each group. Maybe group them by category like food, transportation, school and so on. Just opening a flash card app and seeing 20 randomly selected cards from a deck of 1000 each day may cause confusion.
The Best Side of Deckmill
Of course my main complaint is also one of the biggest advantages of buying Anki cards from Deckmill . When you download Anki cards elsewhere, they are either insufficient or lack context or they are outrageously priced. None of those things are a problem with Deckmill . You get 3000 cards in 8 languages for €14.99 or €11.99 if you use my promotional code HERRANTRIM. That’s 200 example sentences on flash cards with audio for every Euro you spend and that is if you pay full price.
Get Your Discount on Deckmill HERE!
I mentioned before that you can get access to all of the flash cards for all 8 languages for just €14.99, but since you are reading this post, you can get them for 20% off, which means you will only be paying €11.99. Simply type in HERRANTRIM in the promotional code spot when you checkout. Click this link and check them out .
*As I have a partnership with Deckmill , I will get a percentage of every sale when you use my promo code.
More German Learning Resource Reviews
- Recommended Resources
- Websites
- Apps
- Books
If you are really wanting to put your German learning on track, consider joining Herr Antrim’s Deutschlerner Club! For just $14.99 per month you will get access to his full A1 and A2 courses plus new materials as he creates them. You will go from knowing zero German to being able to have a short conversation in a short few weeks. Before you know it, you will be conversational in German on a variety of important topics, all while mastering German grammar.
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