Bunpro vs Renshuu: which one do you actually need (2026)
Short answer: Renshuu is the broader tool and the more generous free one — vocabulary, kanji, grammar and conjugation all on one schedule, and you can run it for years without paying. Bunpro is the narrower one and it is deeper where it is narrow: grammar you have to produce into a blank, with textbook page references and graded reading beside it. If money is the constraint, start with Renshuu. If grammar specifically is the thing that keeps failing you, Bunpro is the better drill. And if your problem is that you can pick the right answer but cannot write the sentence, neither of them checks that, and the last two sections say why.
This page exists because searching "bunpro vs renshuu" returns each product's own pages and a scattering of forum threads, and no page that simply lines the two up. We build a JLPT study app, so we are not a neutral party. The honest version is below, including the part where we say what we do not do.
They overlap more than Bunpro and WaniKani do
These two really are comparable, which is why the question comes up. Both are SRS review systems, both cover grammar, both are built by small teams around JLPT and textbook study. The difference is shape.
Renshuu is a whole study system. Vocabulary, kanji, grammar, conjugation practice and listening drills sit inside one account and one review schedule. It has study lists keyed to the textbooks people actually own (Genki, Minna no Nihongo, Tobira) and to JLPT levels, several quiz formats including typing and handwriting, and a gamified layer that most people either love or ignore. The important part for most learners: the free tier is a real product, not a trial. You can study on it indefinitely.
Bunpro is a grammar course with an SRS bolted to it. Write-ups and structure breakdowns for 900+ grammar points, over 10,000 example sentences, references to Genki and Tobira page numbers, native audio, 120+ graded reading passages, and a Cram mode for the week before an exam. Reviews make you type the grammar form into a blank rather than recognise it. The free tier lets you read the grammar and vocabulary pages and the reading passages; the SRS reviews and decks are Premium, and new accounts get a 30-day Premium trial with no card.
So the question is not "which is better". It is whether you want one system for everything, or the best grammar drill you can get.
The comparison
| Renshuu | Bunpro | |
|---|---|---|
| Covers | Vocab, kanji, grammar, conjugation, listening | Grammar first; vocab and reading decks alongside |
| Grammar review style | Multiple formats, recognition-heavy | Type the form into a sentence blank |
| Free tier | Full study system, permanent | Reading access permanent; 30-day Premium trial |
| Paid tier | renshuu Pro, monthly or lifetime | USD 5.00/month, USD 150.00 lifetime |
| Textbook alignment | Study lists per textbook | Page references inside each write-up |
| Reading practice | Sentence-level, inside quizzes | 120+ graded passages |
| Feel | Gamified, friendly, a lot of surface | Plain, dense, one job |
Bunpro's monthly and lifetime prices were read from bunpro.jp/pricing on 2026-08-22. Bunpro's yearly figure and renshuu Pro's prices are rendered behind account-side scripting we could not read logged out, so we have not guessed at them — check their own pricing pages before you pay.
What Renshuu is genuinely better at
Costing nothing and still being enough. This is the honest headline. A learner with no budget can run Renshuu as their whole SRS for a year and not hit a wall built to make them pay. Very little else in this category can be said to do that.
One schedule instead of four apps. Vocabulary, kanji and grammar in one review queue means one habit to keep, not three. The most common way a study routine dies is fragmentation.
Following the book you already bought. Study lists keyed to Genki, Minna no Nihongo and Tobira mean the app tracks your class rather than competing with it.
Staying pleasant. The gamified layer and the community around it keep people coming back. "Boring but correct" loses to "slightly silly but opened daily", and Renshuu knows it.
What Bunpro is genuinely better at
Grammar you have to produce, not recognise. Typing the form into a blank is a harder and more useful review than picking it from options, and it is much closer to what the JLPT grammar section asks of you. This is the single strongest reason to pay Bunpro.
Explanations that hold up. The write-ups distinguish forms that look interchangeable and cite where each one appears in the textbooks. When two grammar points blur together, Bunpro is where they stop blurring.
Reading in the same place as the grammar. 120+ graded passages sit next to the points you drilled, so there is somewhere to use them immediately.
Cramming on purpose. Cram mode exists for the week before the exam, which is a real use case every other SRS pretends does not happen.
The honest trade
Plenty of learners run both, with Renshuu carrying vocabulary and kanji and Bunpro carrying grammar. That is two systems and two habits, and it works better than it sounds because their review styles differ. If you are picking one:
- No budget — Renshuu, without hesitation, and it is not a compromise pick.
- Vocabulary is the wall — Renshuu. Breadth is its whole design.
- Grammar is the wall — Bunpro. Producing the form is the drill you are missing.
- N5 or N4 soon — Renshuu free plus Bunpro's 30-day trial covers a lot of ground for nothing; run both for a month and keep whichever you actually opened.
- N3 and above — the grammar list is where the difficulty now lives, which usually argues for Bunpro.
Two things neither app does, and it is worth saying plainly: neither one teaches you to write, and neither one reads what you wrote. Both are recognition-and-recall engines, which is the right tool for building raw material and the wrong tool for checking whether you can use it.
Where we fit, and where we do not
We build BetterLingo, a JLPT practice app that marks written answers — you type a full Japanese sentence and it tells you what is wrong with it, rather than checking whether you picked the right option.
We are not a replacement for either of these. To be specific about what we do not have: no SRS deck library, no textbook-keyed study lists, no kanji curriculum, no handwriting recognition, no native-audio sentence bank, and no community with years of threads in it. We are small and new. If you want a scheduler that will still be drilling you in three years, that is what those two are for.
The gap we exist for is narrower. People finish a Renshuu queue or a Bunpro path, sit the exam, and find that recognising a form is not the same as producing one. If you can pick the right answer from four options but cannot write the sentence yourself, adding another review app does not fix it — the missing step is producing Japanese and having something tell you where it broke.
The 30-second version
No money — Renshuu. Everything in one place — Renshuu. Grammar specifically, drilled hard — Bunpro. Both, if you can keep two habits. And if neither is the real problem because the real problem is producing rather than recognising, read Bunpro vs WaniKani for the same argument from the other side.
Next steps
If you want to find out which wall you are actually on, try a written JLPT question and see what happens when nothing is multiple choice. Our Learn hub has more of these comparisons, including Bunpro alternatives and Renshuu vs Anki.