JLPT July 2025

Japanese
#79

Hello Iā€™m learning japanese for 1 year but like really chill only 15 minutes per day and now with bunpro i am studying for 1 month 30 minutes per day.

I will be ready for the N5 in one month but i dont know if i should apply for the N4 and hardwork during 2 months.

I know JLPT N5 or even the N4 sometimes are useless but it was a dream when i was child to got a JLPT degree and this motivate me to work on my japanese.

But my biggest fear is that if i hardwork for the N4 i will be fed up after the exam and stop learning japaneseā€¦ Do you think that I should go for the N5 ? My japanese girlfriend advice me to go the N5, but i feel a bit bad compare to all of people who says that N5 itā€™s useless etcā€¦

What do you think ?

2 Likes
#80

I think you are doing a grate job of not burning out for a long time and it works. I would have done n5 and continued in the same pace. Why brake it if it works well :thinking:

1 Like
#81

Great job on that! I donā€™t mean to discredit this in any way at all, but I used that site and their practice exams in N2 Prep. The tests are good for practice, but donā€™t simulate the actual exam at all in my opinion. They are definitely easier than the real exam. I did 5-6 of their N2 exams and would finish with like 20~30 minutes left over. On the actual test, I had to rush through the last 2 reading passages.

I also worked through some of the reading passages with my tutor, and she pointed out some frequent mistakes or unnatural phrasing in a few of them, which is concerning.

Overall, they are good practice but some flaws. Close to the real thing, but not quite there. Just donā€™t make it your only resource for practicing!

1 Like
#82

Do you (or anybody else) have a better suggestion for mock exams? :slight_smile: Which ones are the closest to the actual exams? Maybe some are especially good for learning and finding weak spots?

#83

I wish that there were more exams that simulate the actual JLPT, but this was the best I found.

https://www.jlpt.jp/e/reference/books.html

They are the official JLPT practice tests. The downside is that they are a little pricey ($10-15) for a single practice test.

I found it to be the closest to the real thing and took the N2 one both at the beginning of my targeted exam prep and post exam-prep (a few weeks before the exam.

Iā€™m sure others will have suggestions, too. There is an abundance of resources out there.

2 Likes
#84

You can get the official practice papers plus audio, answers etc. for all JLPT levels here, completely for free! :slight_smile:

6 Likes
#85

The JLPT N4 and N3 are arguably the most useless levels.

Having N5 will make it easier to get into a Japanese language school on a student visa. The N2 and N1 both give you points on certain visa applications. As far as I know N1 is required to study at a Japanese university. N4 and N3 do not seem to have any concrete benefits attached to them. For job applications, being able to converse in Japanese is way more important than any certificate.

I took all tests and used their scopes to guide my self-study. I also like to collect the certificates like PokĆ©mon gym badges :smiley: So my recommendation is, take N5 now and N4 right after that or whenever youā€™re feeling ready. Unlike school, you can set your own schedule and there should be no need to stress about a hobby by setting arbitrary deadlines.

4 Likes
#86

Itā€™s 15.03 which means registration just opened at Leiden university (and perhaps other places).
Iā€™m really curious to see how high the spike is on their monitoring, because the site is visibly suffering :sweat_smile:

#87

No luck again :frowning: guess thatā€™s it for the summer

#88

Secondly, many people report the website saying registrations are full. Registrations are not full yet. We are looking into why this is happening.

Same as last summer, the database didnā€™t survive the influx of applicants. They will probably have an update on when the registration reopens later today.

#89

I tied to sign up at Leiden, but currently their page says the maximum number of registrations has been reached.

Iā€™m a bit heartbroken.

#90

15-03-2025: Due to the large number of issues, we are closing registrations for now. We will reopen them on 29 March at 13:00. We are deeply sorry for the inconvenience.

Good news is that we can still register.
Bad news is that Iā€™ll be traveling and might miss this new registration window xD

1 Like
#91

Oh, dang. Youā€™re right. I guess Iā€™m one of the people who got the erroneous ā€œfullā€ message.

Well, Iā€™m somewhat relieved, I guess. Thanks for the heads-up!

I hope you can catch the registration during your trip!

2 Likes
#92

Iā€™m heavily leaning into just skipping doing the N3 again and saving the Ā„7500.

As I was close to passing the N3 last time, maybe itā€™s better to just keep making my way toward N2 and take that some time in the future

2 Likes
#93

Iā€™m pretty sure I read you saying you were really close to passing N3 last time, so probably a good call to skip it in my book. Just keep grinding away at the studies and then shoot for N2 in December or next July :muscle:t3:

2 Likes
#94

I think the huge gap in difficulty between N3 and N2 means Iā€™d probably aim for next year but yes Iā€™ll definitely keep grinding!

I can use the Ā„7500 (or Ā„15000) on something thatā€™ll help me get to N2 :relieved:

1 Like
#95

Iā€™ve tried the official N1 sample, and the results were kind of the opposite from what I expected.
Iā€™ve been reading quite a bit lately, but still the reading section of the test felt very draining and time consuming. It seems you are expected to scan those long passages to find key information quickly, but scanning kanji is clearly beyond my ability.
On the other hand, the listening section felt very manageable, even though my listening is not that good. The dialogs are well articulated, and follow a predicable pattern.

6 Likes
#96

ow man, I had the same feeling while trying to register for the exam in Leidenā€¦ This would have been my first application, starting ā€œeasyā€ with N5. We have another shot at 29-03! There is a Reddit post about the location Leiden, it seems to be a s**tshow every yearā€¦

Fingers crossed and hopefully we can get a spot in Leiden! After this year I will go to other locations like Germany or Belgium, seem to have much better facilities, websites etc.

1 Like
#97

Yeah I passed J-Test A-C at an N2 level literally guessing on every reading question. I was not prepared for the time crunch, but it turned out alright. I still did better with random guessing than on the short form listening :pleading_face::+1:

1 Like
#98

The registrations for JLPT at Leiden University opened again today, but I am unable to get the website to work properly. I give up. Iā€™m sad and frustrated, but thereā€™s nothing I can do.

I was ready at the appointed time of 13:00, though the website already started showing problems five minutes in advance. They also placed a warning message that read ā€œif the form gives an error message saying your email address has already been used, please use a different email addressā€.

Registrations did not actually open at 13:00, but at around 13:06, the registration button finally appeared. The website was extremely slow to load, but it did pop up after a couple of minutes and a few refreshes. Uploading my photo took minutes as well. The form didnā€™t work well and contained many typos. It looked very embarrassing.

When sending in the application, the website went down again. After reloading and trying again, the form told me my email address had already been used. I then tried a different email address but the website went down again. At the next try, apparently my second email address was also already in use. I had one final email address that I havenā€™t used in years, but even that one didnā€™t get accepted. I give up.

2 Likes