Good luck to everyone taking the JLPT today if you’re in Japan, or tomorrow if you’re in the west!
I’ll be at the Atlanta, GA, US site getting my feet wet with the N5 tomorrow. Personally, I think preparing for an exam is a great way to fill in cracks and help you raise different aspects of your skills fairly evenly.
Is everyone feeling confident? Or are you dreading one section of the test? 
Feel free to let us all know how you felt you did! And if you did anything in particular to prepare that you think other users might find useful.
glglgl to anyone taking it!
N4 in Philadelphia tomorrow. I expect Kanji to be a breeze (thanks WaniKani!), feeling pretty good about reading, and dreading the listening!
Good luck to everyone participating! Looking forward to hearing a few stories afterward! 
I took the N3 test in Japan yesterday. Although I was scoring high on the practice tests the real thing felt a bit more difficult than usual (I had failed the test last summer by 2 points and failed one time earlier just to “see” what the difference between N4 and N3 was). Vocabulary felt hit and miss; a lot of words were on the test that never came up in the flash card sets I was using. For grammar/reading, this was the first time I almost ran out of time. Grammar felt easier (thanks Bunpro!) but reading just got mentally exhausting. Listening was easier than I remember it being last time, but this is likely because I have to speak/listen to Japanese at work everyday; I think my only mistakes on listening came from the final part and me being absolutely burnt out and unable to pay attention. Somebody’s phone started vibrating during the listening section which threw me off as well but they weren’t able to catch whoever’s phone it was.
Also, as a former web designer, the design on the last question for reading (a flyer) was super flawed. I got it correct but I’m still angry about it. There appeared to be two separate flyers with two separate questions. The flyers were separate and each was clearly labeled as (1) and (2) to link to the corresponding questions. However, a key piece of information for the answer to (2) was found in the (1) image, which means it was a singular flyer broken up into two separate images. Why separate the image? And if you’re going to separate the image, why label it in such a way where it seems like the first image is only relevant to the first question and the second image is only relevant to the second question?
After going through N5, N4, and a couple of N3s I finally saw somebody get their first yellow card!
Not familiar with JLPT, what does yellow card mean?
There are a bunch of rules on the JLPT and much like soccer two yellow cards and you’re out (though you might also receive a red card directly).
A yellow card is when you broke some sort of rule to a minor degree (e.g. didn’t put your pencil down when you were told to, opened your book a bit too early, etc.). Two yellow cards results in a red card which means an automatic failure and I think kicked out of the classroom. You can also get a red card if you’re caught cheating or your phone goes off in the listening section. Usually the proctors are pretty lenient but somebody pushed their luck and kept trying to fill out some answers past the “pencil’s down” time.
I didn’t know there were yellow cards, I just assumed you were kicked out if you broke the rules.
Nice to know, although I hope I don’t get accidentally any. I’ve been to 3 levels already and I was never explained the card system?
I don’t know if they are used everywhere. A friend of mine living in Japan mentioned these, I haven’t heard it mentioned with any of my friends taking the tests here (though I only know 2 people actually doing JLPT here, so my scope is very limited 
)
I’ve been to 4 different locations for my tests, although granted they all have been in the same country. I haven’t seen them in any of them.
I’ll probably retake the N3 this summer. We will see.
Might just be a Japanese thing then I haven’t taken any JLPT’s myself, so I can’t comment with any certainty on how it’s done here, I’ll see if I can bother my friends tomorrow to ask, because I’ve gotten quite curious now!
Thinking of taking any soon? Is there a location to take near you?
We do have one (relatively) close, but I’ve never been all that interested. I’m just doing this as a hobby really so never saw the need for accreditation. I have been toying around with the idea of taking them starting at N5 though, so maybe next year 
Oh, I don’t do it for accreditation as there’s no much use of Japanese around here.
Is more like a self-test. It’s a funny thing to add to the CV though.
i took N4 in philly, probably saw some of you. I think Vocab/Grammar/reading was a breeze, listening was crushingly hard. (probably < 50% in this section for me especially the long dialogue questions).
Does anyone have any suggestions on improving the listening section? that’s one where there aren’t many good resources for.
I took the N2 and failed for the 2nd time because I ran out of time in the first section and couldnt finish reading everthing. Listening was pretty easy.
I used these materials for passing the N4:
新完全マスター has a book for N4 listening that has content that will be similar to what you find on the test.
The Japan Foundation and JEES, the companies that created the JLPT, also have two practice test workbooks with content that has been on previous tests.
I found both of these to be extremely helpful because the vocabulary, grammar, speed, and content are all the exact same as the test.
I am using this youtube channel Tuhoconline.net - YouTube to practice listening since it contains actual JLPT listening tests. Although it is in vietnamese (I think) the only vietnamese text is directions and the right answer (which is a number, so no need to know vietnamese obviously). It does not have many N4 tests, but a search on youtube with “JLPT listening practice” gives many results, such as this one Light Smit ▽ 日本 - YouTube.
Took my first JLPT test yesterday and felt I couldn’t pass 
. The N3 reading section was really tricky though.