Hey all,
I’m not super active on these forums but I wanted to make a little post to celebrate my 365 day streak on Bunpro! I was always so worried I would accidentally miss a day and ruin my streak but happy to say I finally got it. I figured I’d make a post that could be insightful and/or inspirational for others or worst case it’ll be nice for me to revisit after I hit two years. 
I’ll try to make it relatively brief and to the point.
I had some background learning Japanese from a while back but didn’t really get too far. (maybe just shy of N5) then I quit for a while and have picked it back up recently with a renewed motivation with a plan of eventually moving to Japan in a few years. My goal is to hopefully get up to N2 by the end of next year (Probably won’t quite get there but it’s nice to have the goal). I’ll have to start giving the practice tests a go and see where I’m at currently. Hoping I can pass N4. 
Current Study Routine
I primarily study through apps/flashcards with casual listening practice thrown in. Currently using: Wanikani (w/ the Smouldering Durtles App), Bunpro (Vocab and Grammar), Satori Reader and Youtube/Podcasts designed learning. I do flashcards (Bunpro/Wanikani) every morning and evening and in the middle of the day if I get a bit of time here and there. I go through grammar/conversation videos when I eat lunch and listen to Podcasts when I go for a walk or are running errands. I tried a bit of manga/anime but I find I get a lot more out of the content specifically for learning as I am able to follow a lot more and stay engaged. I’m prioritizing Kanji a bit so my primary reviews/lessons are WaniKani which take up a lot of time. I’m at level 33 at the moment and really looking forward to finishing off that to free up a lot more of my time. After Kanji I get through all my Bunpro Vocab/Grammar and Lessons and if I have time maybe some bonus reading with Saotori Reader.
Progress
At the beginning of the year I could barely understand anything spoken no matter how basic and to read a sentence took a really long time and I’d have to look up a considerable amount of the words. Now I feel like with listening as long as the subject matter uses mostly words I’m familiar with and the speaking isn’t too quick I can generally follow along or at least “get the gist” of things. I’m best at reading at the moment. My plan is to hopefully get to a point where I can somewhat quickly read through a lot of native content and then use that as my primary learning mechanism until I can follow along quickly enough that I can “graduate” to more complex listening practice.
Things I’ve found useful so far
I have heard others say it but I really think learning Kanji early on has been super helpful (although annoying since it takes so much time). But while I read I’m continuously practicing my kanji and it also helps a great deal with vocab memorization/understanding because the meanings kind of help out with hints and patterns for words. Also for Wanikani I use the Smouldering Durtles App so I can customize things. I grade myself without filling in the blank to save time on typing and save myself from typo errors. For custom Bunpro settings I turn the Ghosts setting to “On” as opposed to Minimal. I really find if there’s something I’m having trouble with I need to see it a lot so I really enjoy that. Also set my SRS Strictness to 3 stages for similar reasons. I found if it just goes down a bit when I mess up I just wasn’t seeing things often enough.
I think that’s the main stuff. Thanks to the Bunpro team for making an awesome app! If it wasn’t for this I don’t think I’d be remotely as far along as I am now. I always feel like I have so far to go but it’s nice to look back and see how far I’ve already come so far.
