Listen and read
Japanese podcasts with transcripts & furigana
Japanese podcasts are some of the best listening practice you can get — but raw audio with no text is brutal when you can’t catch a word. Here’s how to listen with a synced transcript and furigana, so you can read along and look anything up instantly.
Why raw podcasts are so hard
A native podcast throws real speed, real vocabulary, and no safety net at you. Miss one word and you can lose the whole sentence — there’s nothing to read, nothing to tap, no furigana over the kanji you don’t know yet. Most learners give up on authentic audio for exactly this reason.
What a transcript + furigana change
With a synced transcript, the words move as you listen — so you can read along instead of guessing. Furigana sits over the kanji, so a reading you don’t know never blocks you. And when a word still doesn’t click, you tap it for the meaning right there — no switching to a dictionary and losing your place.
Shows you can read along to
In Wakatta these real learner podcasts come with tappable transcripts and furigana — from absolute beginner to native speed:
Common questions
Do Japanese podcasts come with transcripts?
Most don’t. A few creators publish transcripts on their own site or Patreon, but it’s rare and rarely synced to the audio. Wakatta generates a synced, tappable transcript with furigana for the shows in its library, so you can read along to podcasts that never had one.
What is furigana, and why does it help?
Furigana is the small kana printed over kanji that shows how to read it. For learners it’s the difference between recognizing a word and being stuck — you can follow along even past your kanji level.
Can I look up words while I listen?
Yes. Tap any word in the transcript for its reading and meaning, save it, and Wakatta replays it later with the exact sentence and audio you first heard.
Read along to real Japanese podcasts
Wakatta turns real Japanese podcasts into tappable transcripts — tap any word for its reading and meaning, and review what you save with the original audio.
Soon
