China Digital

From Study Xi to Himalaya FM: Top 5 Popular Chinese Learning & Study Apps

These are some of the most popular study and learning apps for Chinese mobile users.

Published

5 months ago

March 31, 2019

Study apps are more popular in China than ever before. These are the apps that are favorites among Chinese mobile users, to expand their knowledge and study online.

Just three years ago, we wrote about the booming business of e-learning in China and the increasing popularity of cyber studying. In a time when Chinese mobile users spend more time on their phones than ever, the market has developed a lot since then, and study apps have become more popular than ever before.

The rise of online education (在线教育) has made it possible for people to study any topic they like, no matter how old they are, where they live, or what they do. Moreover, compared to traditional education, online studying is relatively cheap, or even free, making education more accessible to people from all layers of Chinese society. In this way, online education is a source of opportunities – both for mobile users and for companies tapping into the market.

We made our selections in our lists based on the data from the Android app stores Tencent, Baidu, Huawei, and Zhushou360. We tried our best to give you a representative overview of a variety of apps that are currently most used within this category in China, but want to remind you that these lists are no official “top 5” charts.

This article is the last of a series of five articles, listing popular Chinese apps in the categories of short video & live streaming, news, health & sports, and mobile games. We’ll list the other categories for you below this article, but let’s move over to review these mobile study and learning apps now.

#1 Help with Homework 作业帮

Help with Homework, as the name already suggests, is an app that provides primary and secondary students with study-enhancing features, offering help with courses including Chinese, English, math, history, physics, and chemistry.

In the partly free app, students can take pictures of their homework or tests. The app will then tell them if they made any mistakes. There is also a tutoring function including audio, free lessons, extra study material, a question bank, and a dictionary. It is also possible for users to upload their own essay which will then serve as an example for others.

The app was launched in 2014 by a like-named company in Beijing. Throughout the years, the app won several awards, but more importantly, it became the holy grail of every young student across the country.

According to their own website, Help with Homework has over 400 million users. And according to a report by Jiguang, more than 84 percent of the children up to the age of 15 who have a smartphone have a favorable attitude towards the app. But not only children benefit from the app. More than 82 percent of people in the age category 36 to 45 also showed a positive attitude toward the app.

In the Tencent Appstore and Apple stores, the app currently ranks subsequently first and fifth most popular education app.

#2 Study Xi Strong Country 学习强国

Study Xi is an app that was launched by the Propaganda Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party. The app was launched on January 1st of this year, and has been a hit ever since.

The app is a multi-functional educational platform that offers users various ways to study Xi Jinping Thought, Party history, Chinese culture, history, and much more. To encourage users to study, the app also awards its users with incentives. There are several ways to earn points, for example through reading articles, watching videos, spending a certain amount of time on the app, sharing or saving articles or getting all the answers right with a quiz. With enough points, users can get discounts or free items online.

For more about this app, check out our ‘Everything you need to know about the Study Xi app‘ article.

In the Apple store, the app currently ranks the most popular app overall.

#3 Himalaya FM 喜马拉雅FM

Himalaya is China’s most popular audio sharing platform. The app was first launched in 2013 and was an instant success. Within two years, the app reached 200 million users, and continued steady growth. In 2017, Himalaya was selected amongst the 30 most influential Chinese enterprises of the century.

According to the company’s website, Himalaya currently caters to 450 million people. They offer users a wide variety of (educational) podcasts, audiobooks, (live) radio, and music. Some audio is free, some features need to be paid for. For most paid features, users can first partly listen to the audio-book before they can decide upon whether or not they want to purchase it.

But Himalaya is not only about audio content. It is also Himalaya‘s mission to “empower podcast creators.” By providing production, distribution, and marketing support, the app also helps creators to connect with their audiences and allow them to earn money.

In the fourth quarter of 2018, Himalaya’s daily active users grew from 12 million to 13.4 million, making it the most popular app of 2018 in the category of knowledge.

Himalaya is also available in English. However, the Chinese and International Himalaya are two separate apps and use a different logo.

#4 iReader 掌阅

iReader is amongst the leading digital reading distribution platforms globally. The company was established in 2008, and since then set up cooperations with over 600 copyright collectives. Following the domestic success, iReader went global in 2015, and is now available in more than 150 countries and has 500 million users worldwide.

The Chinese version of the app divides its content in manga and “bookstore or book city” (书城), meaning everything but manga. Both categories, however, offer a wide variety of subjects. At first sight, most content is (partly) paid, but there is also a button for free books, audio books, and podcasts, offering access to a mass of content that helps to build on knowledge and to study.

According to a report by Jiguang, iReader was China’s 62nd most successful app in 2018.

#5 Kai Shu Story 凯叔讲故事

Kai Shu Story is both a storytelling app for young children as a publishing house for children’s books. The app is mainly focused on children in the kindergarten and primary school age group, offering a wide range of genres including fables and fairy tales, science and history, famous foreign works, and – perhaps the most popular – Chinese literary works.

Different from most of the apps we covered in our “top 5 selections”, the most popular content of Kai Shu Story is has a paywall. Top paid packages include The Three Kingdoms, Poetry is Coming, Journey to the West and Kai Shu Tells History, where China’s history starting from the Shang Xia period up to the end of the Qing Dynasty is told in 635 stories.

In order to offer all users the opportunity to explore and learn in a fun way, the app also provides plenty of free content. But that is not all there is to it. Most stories end with a question to readers, who are then free to share their answers or post other remarks in a group chat. And for those whose listening skills are not so strong, most stories come with a written script too – also making this an excellent app for foreigners studying Chinese!

Kai Shu Story is founded by Mr. Wang Kai (王凯), a former host of China’s Central Television Station (CCTV) and dubbing artist (see featured image of this article). Kai dubbed thousands of famous TV dramas and movies before he resigned to spend more time with his children.

One afternoon – so the story goes – he accidentally shared a story recording for his daughter with his daughter’s kindergarten group-chat. After hearing the audio, Kai immediately received enthusiastic reactions from parents asking him to upload more stories. With his love for telling stories, he continued sharing his readings, and in no-time gathered a small fanbase. The members in the group chat gave him the affectionate name ‘Kai Shu,’ which literally translates as ‘Uncle Kai.’

From 2014 to 2016, the group-chat evolved into an official WeChat account, which subsequently led to the app. Since the launch of the app in 2016, Kai and his team have uploaded more than 8000 stories, which have been played around 3 billion times, adding up to a staggering 229 million hours of listening, according to the official website.

Kai Shu Story is currently ranked among China’s top-grossing education apps in the Chinese Apple Store.

Also see:

By Gabi Verberg, edited by Manya Koetse

Follow @whatsonweibo

Spotted a mistake or want to add something? Please let us know in comments below or email us.

Up Next

Digitalizing China’s Beauty Industry: Introducing Supermakeup’s ‘Beauty Charging Stations’

Don't Miss

The Tom Hiddleston China ‘Centrum’ Commercial That Has Got Everyone Confused

Gabi Verberg

Gabi Verberg is a Business graduate from the University of Amsterdam who has worked and studied in Shanghai and Beijing. She now lives in Amsterdam and works as a part-time translator, with a particular interest in Chinese modern culture and politics.

1 Comment

Pingback: Top 5 of Chinese Learning & Study Apps – Mike's Blog

China Digital

“Taobao Life”: This Feature Shows How Much Money You’ve Spent on Taobao

Some users just found out they could’ve bought a house with the money they’ve spent on Taobao.

Published

4 weeks ago

July 29, 2019

Manya Koetse

Over the past few days, a new Taobao feature that allows users to see how much money they have spent on the online shopping platform is flooding Chinese social media.

Taobao Marketplace is China’s biggest online shopping platform. Owned by tech giant Alibaba, Taobao was launched in 2003 to facilitate consumer-to-consumer retail.

For many people, Taobao shopping has become part of their everyday life. Whether it is clothes, pet food, accessories, electronics, furniture – you name it, Taobao has it.

Because buying on Taobao is so easy, fast, and convenient, many online consumers lose track of how much they actually spent on the platform – especially if they have been using it for years already.

Thanks to “Taobao Life,” users can now see the total amount of money spent on their account.

How to do it? First: go to Taobao settings and click the profile account as indicated below.

Image by whatsonweibo.com

Then click the top icon that says “Achievement” (成就).

Image by whatsonweibo.com

And here you find what you have spent in this account in total. On the left: the money spent, on the right: the amount of purchases.

Image by whatsonweibo.com

Since I’ve used started using this Taobao account for the occasional clothes shopping since 2016, I’ve made 122 purchases, spending 7849 yuan ($1140) – a very reasonable amount compared to some other Taobao users, who are now finding out they could have practically bought an apartment with the money they have spent on Taobao.

This user, for example, found out they spent over half a million yuan on Taobao ($75,500).

Image via whatsonweibo.com

This user below has spent over 1,1 million yuan on Taobao ($170,000).

Some people discuss all the things they could have bought with the money they have spent on Taobao over the years: “As soon as I saw the number, I wanted to cry,” one Weibo user writes: “What have I done?!”

Another person, finding out they have spent 230,000 yuan on Taobao ($33,400), writes: “This can’t be true! Surely this must be a mistake!?”

“If I wouldn’t have spent all this money on Taobao, I would’ve been rich,” others say.

The topic of Taobao’s total spending amount has become so popular on Chinese social media this week, causing so much consternation, that Taobao posted a message on its Weibo account on July 27, writing: “We heard you guys couldn’t sleep last night..”

Although many people are shocked to find out the money they’ve spent on Taobao, others console themselves with the thought that adding up everything they have spent on Taobao, they were actually ‘rich’ at some point in their lives.

By Manya Koetse , with contributions from Miranda Barnes
Follow @whatsonweibo

Spotted a mistake or want to add something? Please let us know in comments below or email us. Please note that your comment below will need to be manually approved if you’re a first-time poster here.

China Digital

Summer Censorship: Weibo Launches “Project Sky Blue”

No hot summer on Weibo: the social media network announces extra censorship on ‘vulgar content.’

Published

2 months ago

July 6, 2019

What's on Weibo Team

Earlier this week, the administration of Sina Weibo announced a special summer holiday crackdown on “vulgar content,” including “pornographic novels, erotic anime, pictures or videos.”

In a public announcement that was posted on July 4th, the Weibo administration writes that the primary goal of this campaign is to “create a healthier, more positive environment for underage users” during the summer break period.

The censorship plan is titled “Project Deep Blue” (or: “Project Sky Blue”) (蔚蓝计划), and will use filter systems, human moderators and user reports to censor more content for the upcoming two months.

The project even has its own Weibo account now, where Weibo users can ask questions, report inappropriate content, and get more information on the campaign.

Weibo states it will further expand its team of online content supervisors, and also explicitly encourages netizens to flag ‘inappropriate’ content to make the online community ‘more wholesome.’

The hashtag #ProjectDeepBlue (#蔚蓝计划#) topped the hot search lists on Weibo this week; not necessarily because of the topic’s popularity, but because it was placed there by the social media site’s administration. At time of writing, the hashtag page has attracted more than 180 million views.

Online responses to the summer censorship program are mixed: many commenters voice their support for the latest measure, while others express frustration.

One Weibo user from Hubei calls the latest measure “hypocritical,” arguing that minors surf Weibo just as much during school time as during the summer holiday – suggesting that launching a special censorship program for the summer vacation does not make sense at all.

But many popular comments are in favor of the project, saying: “I support Project Deep Blue, the internet needs to be cleaned up,” and: “China’s young people need to be protected.”

This is not the first time Weibo launches a special intensified censorship program. Throughout the years, it has repeatedly carried out ‘anti-pornography‘ campaigns in cooperation with Chinese cyberspace authorities.

Often, the crusade against ‘vulgar’ content also ends up being used for the purpose of censoring political content rather than to actually eradicate ‘obscenities’ (read more).

By now, it seems that many Weibo users are quite actively using the Project Deep Blue tag to report on other users who are posting violent or vulgar content.

“If you’re not careful, you’re hit with vulgar and obscene content the moment you’re on the internet,” well-known mom blogger Humapanpan (@虎妈潘潘) writes: “Now that the summer holiday is coming, I hope we can join the Project Deep Blue, and clean up the internet environment. Actively report obscene content the moment you see it – let’s protect our future together.”

By Skylar Xu & Manya Koetse

Follow @whatsonweibo