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7 min read3 hours ago

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I closed my Kindle one evening and realized I couldn’t remember a single word I’d looked up. Not one. I’d tapped them, read the definitions, nodded along — then watched them vanish. This wasn’t occasional forgetfulness. This was a pattern, and it was driving me crazy.

I love reading. Novels, biographies, philosophy, psychology, science, way too many comics. My Kindle’s built-in dictionary is brilliant — long-press any word and boom, instant definition. But here’s the thing: looking up a word doesn’t mean you’ll remember it. I kept telling myself that repeated exposure would eventually make them stick. I was wrong. Some words I’ve looked up a dozen times, and I still draw a blank every single time.

So I did what any serious learner does — I turned to flashcards and spaced repetition. My Kindle has a vocabulary builder that auto-generates cards from words I look up. Seemed perfect. Except it has no spaced repetition algorithm and the features are bare bones. Dead end.

Next stop: Anki. The heavyweight champion of SRS platforms. I went deep — custom stylesheets, plugins, automation scripts to import my Kindle vocabulary. It worked, sort of. The review system was solid, but creating cards? Absolutely brutal. I had hundreds of imported words sitting there, and each one needed definitions, examples, context. The mobile app is great for reviewing but pretty much useless for creating cards on the go. Which meant every time I encountered a new word while reading, I had to choose: break my flow to laboriously create a card, or skip it and lose the moment. Eventually the friction just killed my motivation. I stopped using it.

I wasn’t sure what to do next. Then I read two books that completely reframed how I thought about vocabulary learning.

Forever Fluent hit me with something obvious that I’d somehow missed: memory needs rich context. All those “word of the day” apps I’d tried? They failed because isolated definitions give your brain nothing to grab onto. The book makes it clear — if you want words to stick, you need visual context, proper pronunciation, and real usage examples. Suddenly I understood why I could recognize so many words on the page but couldn’t pronounce them or recall them in conversation. I was learning half the word.

*Word Power Made Easy *drove the point home and added another layer: etymology. Knowing where a word comes from and how it evolved doesn’t just make learning more interesting — it deepens your understanding of what the word actually means. The book has great exercises and quizzes, though tying them into a spaced repetition system takes extra work.

What I needed was obvious now: a tool that combined contextual learning, pronunciation, etymology, and seamless SRS integration — with flashcard creation that didn’t feel like a second job. Nothing out there did all of this. So I built LexiForge.

How it works

Type a word, hit “add word,” and LexiForge does the rest. It pulls pronunciation audio, contextual images, definitions, parts of speech, synonyms, antonyms, usage examples, and etymological information. Everything gets assembled into a complete flashcard automatically. No hunting for images. No copying definitions. No deciding which example sentence sounds natural. Just the word and one button press.

Compare that to traditional flashcard creation: find a good image, download it, crop it, upload it, copy-paste a definition, write or find example sentences, add pronunciation if you can figure out how. LexiForge handles all of that in seconds.

Make it yours

Here’s the thing about memory — personal relevance matters. LexiForge generates cards automatically, but you can customize them however you want:

• Upload your own images or link to ones from the web
• Write custom examples that actually mean something to you
• Add personal notes about context or meaning

The more a word connects to your life, the better you’ll remember it.

AI does the heavy lifting

Can’t find the right image? Don’t have time to hunt one down? LexiForge’s AI generates contextually appropriate images in seconds, even for abstract concepts. It can also create diverse usage examples across different scenarios. Coming soon: AI-generated notes and summaries for deeper understanding.

Smarter practice

LexiForge uses the FSRS algorithm to optimize retention. Unlike traditional flashcard systems with fixed intervals, FSRS learns your memory patterns. Struggle with a word? You’ll see it again soon. Nail it consistently? It’ll back off for weeks. The algorithm figures out exactly when you’re about to forget and catches you at that perfect moment to lock the word into long-term memory. You end up spending less time on words you know and more time on the ones that need work.

Sound comes first

This part’s crucial. Inspired by Forever Fluent, LexiForge flips the script on how flashcards work. When you visit a word’s detail page, you hear its pronunciation immediately. During practice sessions, the pronunciation plays first — no spelling, no definition, just the sound. Then you test yourself on whether you remember the spelling and meaning.

Why? Because this mirrors how we actually encounter words. Someone says something in conversation, and you either recognize it or you don’t. If you can’t recognize a word by sound, you won’t be able to use it confidently when speaking or catch it when listening. Pronunciation isn’t secondary — it’s the foundation.

Kindle integration

LexiForge imports vocabulary and highlighted passages from your Kindle. You connect your Kindle to your computer, grab the vocab.db file, and upload it to LexiForge. It’s a few steps, sure — but compare that to manually typing out every word you’ve ever looked up. Each imported word preserves the original context where you encountered it, then gets automatically enriched with imagery, pronunciation, etymology, and linguistic details before being scheduled for FSRS review. One upload can bring in hundreds of words in a few minutes.

Smart recommendations

The best way to discover vocabulary is still through reading. That’s why Kindle integration exists. But sometimes you need deliberate practice — maybe you’re preparing for a test, building professional vocabulary, or you’re between books and want to keep momentum. That’s where AI recommendations come in.

LexiForge analyzes your learning patterns and suggests words that connect to what you already know. If you’re strong with adjectives but weak on technical verbs, it adapts. The system identifies gaps and builds on your strengths, giving you a curated list when you want structured practice rather than leaving you to guess what’s next.

It’s optional. If you prefer discovering words purely through reading, that works perfectly. But if you want targeted improvement or have specific goals, the recommendations are there — evolving as you learn, always calibrated to your current level.

What’s coming: Structured learning paths

Random vocabulary acquisition is messy and inefficient. Inspired by “Word Power Made Easy,” I’m building curated learning paths that group words by theme or subject. These will include etymology deep dives, interactive exercises, and quizzes — all synchronized with spaced repetition reviews. Structured paths give you clear direction instead of haphazard word collection.

Why not completely free?

I need to be honest about something: running LexiForge costs real money. Every AI-generated image, every pronunciation file, every recommendation — these hit APIs that charge per request. Then there’s cloud storage for your vocabulary data, database hosting, server infrastructure, and hundreds of hours of development work.

Here’s what I’ve done to keep this sustainable: the core experience is free and will stay free. You can import Kindle vocabulary, create unlimited flashcards with all the linguistic data, practice with spaced repetition, and track your progress without paying anything. LexiForge’s free tier gives you everything you need to stop forgetting words you look up.

Premium features exist for people who want AI to handle everything — unlimited image generation, personalized recommendations, curated learning paths. Those cost money to provide, and Premium subscriptions ($6.99–9.99/month) keep the infrastructure running while funding continued development. If you’re a casual reader adding a few words weekly, you’ll probably never need to upgrade. If you’re building vocabulary aggressively or preparing for tests, Premium removes all friction and saves hours of work.

The goal is sustainability. Free users get a complete, powerful tool. Premium users fund the infrastructure and get personalized AI guidance, advanced learning features, and complete automation in return.

Beta launch

Building LexiForge took weeks of design work and creative engineering — balancing features with cost efficiency to keep most of it free forever. The beta is live right now at lexiforge.app.

I’m looking for vocabulary enthusiasts to test it and help shape where it goes next. Your feedback and bug reports are genuinely valuable at this stage. As thanks, the first 100 users get three months of premium membership.

Fair warning: there are rough edges. You’ll hit bugs. But if you’ve struggled with the same vocabulary learning problems I described — if you’ve abandoned flashcard systems because they demanded too much effort, if you’ve forgotten words you swore you’d remember — LexiForge might actually solve what nothing else could.

Check out the full feature list here.

Native iOS and Android test apps are coming at the start of 2026, bringing the full LexiForge experience to your pocket with optimized mobile performance.