TLDR: Made a new webapp for keigo practice – for free and for anyone to use!

A (very long) while back, I wrote an article about how keigo (敬語 – Japanese honorifics) is both indispensable but also is being overcomplicated.

Well it’s been a few years since then. The world has changed and keigo has not. It continues to be one of the biggest roadblocks to foreigners being socially and professionally functional in Japan. And despite the world now being very heavily AI-driven – AI is not going to save people from the spectre of keigo, given how common it is in daily speech and use in Japan.

I therefore decided to make a little webapp for anyone who wishes to learn and/or practice their keigo. You can find it at www.keigoisgrammar.com!

Features

The app is basically for people to drill their keigo knowledge and understanding. Some features are:

• A full set of explanations
• A set of more than 300 questions – divided between basic and advanced topics
• Countdown-style quiz – because it’s important to build keigo muscle memory
• Quick links to the appropriate section when someone gets something wrong
• A leaderboard for you competitive types

This app is vibe-coded but the content, both its explanations and questions, is audited by eye. (Which means there may be some human error in there – please forgive and report them if you see any).

About the name

I was wavering about whether to call this keigoasgrammar honestly, to avoid ruffling some grammarian feathers. But more important than linguistic pedantry, I think that keigoisgrammar fits better with how it should be learnt. And there are some clear grammatical features in keigo which I explain on the why keigoisgrammar page.