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This is a community-maintained list of resources for learning Mandarin Chinese.

Alphabetical Index

Just write in the appropriate answer/section. If you have concerns, questions, post a meta question, so we don't clutter the comments, but you can link your meta question from the comments.

Organization

  • Answers have a type of resource each.
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  • Include links to the sites only, don't post images, they would take too much space.
  • Add the resources in alphabetical order so they're easier to find.
  • Please only include resources that have some kind of notoriety (we don't want to be flooded by useless resources).

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    Few people ever realize, that it's not about the resources. It's how you use them. Most of those shiny ipad and smartphone apps are useless toys. Apps don't learn Chinese, it's you who need to make the efforts, which no app can replace. Computer aid hardly makes language learning any better. The only thing in this context a computer can help you is getting access to target language media. The rest is mostly just (commercial) products you don't need. You most likely download and install way more stuff than you can use and profit from.
    – Kovács Imre
    Jan 3 '14 at 14:00
  • 3
    @KovácsImre I disagree. Apps provide extremely valuable help for reading that open up many new possibilities. See for instance hackingchinese.com/…
    – goPlayerJuggler
    Oct 20 '16 at 9:08

14 Answers 14

Active Oldest Votes
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Browser Add-ons

General

There are also many browser highlighters available (too many to list; Google it), which enable you to highlight and save text for later review.

Popup dictionaries

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Websites

Blogs

Databases

See also Dictionaries.

Example sentences

Flashcards and Writing

Forum

General learning

Grammar

Multimedia lessons

Reading

Translation

Web tools

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Software for learning

Tools

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Language Exchanges

Various websites to find language exchange partners, people will meet in person or talk online and help each other learn each others' respective languages.

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Podcasts

You can find many such podcasts by searching for Chinese on e.g. Spotify or Tune In

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Apps

Dictionaries

  • Hanping Chinese Dictionary Pro 汉英词典 (Android; $US 2.99) includes handwriting recognition, native speaker audio, stroke animations, example sentences, idioms, HSK words, etc. More functionality via in-app purchases, e.g. Hanping Camera ($US 9.99) and Hanping Chinese Popup ($US 9.99).

  • Pleco (iOS; Android) free dictionary with example sentences; many additional features e.g. OCR via in-app purchases.

  • Ponddy Chinese Dictionary (iPhone).

Flashcards and Writing

Games

  • 酷狗唱唱 (iPhone; QQ) is a Chinese karaoke app which gives you a score based on your singing.

  • NiHao! (iPad; $US 4.99) grammar and puzzle game.

  • Word Swing (iOS; Android) is a choose-your-own-adventure text adventure game (paid version required for full access).

General learning

Reading and Listening

Translations and OCR

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  • There used to be a reading app known as Decipher but I think it has aged away. The website has some remaining parts.
    – Becky 李蓓 ♦
    Sep 2 '20 at 12:04
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Online Courses

Tutors

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Textbooks

See also Chinese textbook grammar index at the Chinese Grammar Wiki.

Learning

  • Yong Ho, Beginner's Chinese, 2010. Amazon.

  • ShaoLan. Chineasy Everyday: Learning Chinese Through Its Culture, 2016. Amazon. (Now available as an app).

  • Kan Qian, Colloquial Chinese: The Complete Course for Beginners, 2015. Amazon; Routledge. Texts, exercises, grammar highlights, etc.

  • Jiang Liping, HSK Standard Course (HSK标准教程), ~2018. Amazon: HSK 1; 2; 3; 4上; 4下；5上 and 5下; 6上 and 6下. Answers are available from BLCUP, specifically 1; 2; 3; 4上; 4下; 5上; 5下; 6上; 6下.

  • Yuehua Liu et al., Integrated Chinese: Simplified Characters Textbook, Level 1, Part 1 中文听说读写, 2008. Amazon; Cheng & Tsui.

  • Yong Ho, Intermediate Chinese, 2013. Amazon.

  • Peking University, Modern Chinese: A Basic Course, 1971. Amazon.

  • Liu Xun, New Practical Chinese Reader, 2004. Amazon.

  • James W. Heisig and Timothy W. Richardson, Remembering Traditional Hanzi and Remembering Simplified Hanzi, 2008+. Amazon: T1, T2; S1, S1; Nanzan T1, T2; S1, S2. A method for memorizing Chinese characters without their pronunciation. (See also: a fan-made dataset for simplified characters.)

  • Yuonne Li Walls and Jan W. Walls, Using Chinese - A guide to contemporary usage, 2009. Amazon.

Reference

  • Muhammad Wolfgang G. A. Schmidt, All the Grammar and Language Points For Each Of The Six Levels of the Chinese Language Proficiency Test (HSK), 2018. Amazon.

  • Yip Po-Ching and Dan Rimmington, Chinese - An Essential Grammar, 2006. Amazon.

  • Charles N. Li and Sandra A. Thompson, Mandarin Chinese: A Functional Reference Grammar, 1989. Amazon; Google Books. Only pinyin (no characters).

  • Claudia Ross and Jing-heng Sheng Ma, Modern Mandarin Chinese Grammar: A Practical Guide (Modern Grammars), 2014. Amazon.

  • Dejin Li and Meizhen Cheng, A Practical Chinese Grammar for Foreigners (外国人实用汉语语法), 2008. Amazon. Bilingual (English and Chinese); characters only.

  • Claudia Ross, Schaum's Outline of Chinese Grammar, 2004. Amazon.

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Dictionaries

Online

Image search provided by Baidu, Bing, and Google can be used as a visual dictionary. Many dictionaries are listed at Dictionaryphile.

Technical

Offline

  • ABC dictionary - available as a paid-for add-on in Pleco. Gives parts of speech and rates homonyms by frequency of usage. See also this answer.

  • CC-CEDICT (Wiki) is downloadable as a plain text file.

  • Hanping Chinese Dictionary Pro 汉英词典 (Android; $US 2.99).

  • Pleco (iOS; Android) free dictionary with example sentences; many additional features e.g. OCR via in-app purchases.

  • Wenlin. Non-introductory versions start at $US 2.99 per month.

Many dictionaries are downloadable from HuZheng.org.

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Books

Graded readers

(Note: Fig. 7 in Loach (2017) analyzes the difficulty of Mandarin Companion and Sinolingua.)

Novels

Also note a Reddit /r/chinesebookclub post sorts Chinese novels by difficulty (results). The YouTube channel Kuo’s Audiobooks has readings of Harry Potter novels.

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Lists of Resources

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Online Tests

How many characters do I know?

How many words do I know?

How fast can I read?

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