Anki New Cards per Day Calculator
See step-by-step calculation
If you have a vocabulary deck with N cards and a deadline in days, this calculator tells you how many new cards to add per day to finish on time. The formula is simple: total cards ÷ days. The valuable part is the derived estimate: how many reviews you'll accumulate and how many daily minutes you'll need once the deck reaches steady state (around day 21). One new card generates on average ~7 reviews over the following weeks according to SM-2 and FSRS scheduling data. Overshooting your daily new-card rate is the #1 reason learners abandon Anki decks — this tool gives you the exact number for a sustainable pace.
New cards per day = total cards in the deck ÷ days available. Example: 1,500 cards in 90 days = 16.7 new cards/day. Each new card generates roughly 7 reviews over its first weeks, so ~17 new/day implies ~117 reviews/day (~26 min/day) once the deck reaches steady state around day 21.
When to use this calculator
- A college student preparing for the GRE in 60 days who needs to memorize a 900-card high-frequency word deck (15 new cards/day, ~24 min/day).
- A Spanish learner aiming for B2 who wants to finish a 2,000–3,000 card vocabulary deck over 6 months at a sustainable daily rate.
- A medical student pacing a 1,200-card pharmacology deck across the 70 days before a board exam.
- A software engineer studying for the JLPT who needs to absorb a 2,000-card vocabulary deck within 4 months.
- Comparing two strategies for the same deck: finishing in 3 intensive months vs. 12 relaxed months, and seeing the daily review load of each.
Example: B2 English deck in 3 months
- B2 English vocabulary deck: 1,500 cards.
- Available time: 90 days (3 months).
- New cards/day = 1,500 ÷ 90 = 16.7.
- Rounding up: 17 new cards per day.
- Estimated reviews at steady state: ~16.7 × 7 ≈ 117 per day.
- Estimated time: (16.7 × 25 s) + (117 × 10 s) ≈ 417 + 1,170 = 1,587 s ≈ 26 min/day.
How it works
3 min readHow It's Calculated
The optimal pace of new cards in Anki comes from dividing the deck size by the available days:
New cards/day = Total cards ÷ Days available
Reviews/day (steady state) ≈ New cards/day × 7
Daily time (min) = (New × 25 s + Reviews × 10 s) ÷ 60Anki's scheduler (SM-2 or FSRS) plans the reviews automatically, so you don't need to calculate them by hand. What you do control is the number of new cards per day: that parameter regulates how much future work you're generating. Each new card you add today creates a cascade of roughly 6–10 review repetitions over its first weeks.
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Quick Reference Table
| New/day | Reviews/day (est.) | Time/day | Words in 30 days | Words in 90 days |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 | ~35 | ~8 min | 150 | 450 |
| 10 | ~70 | ~16 min | 300 | 900 |
| 15 | ~105 | ~24 min | 450 | 1,350 |
| 20 | ~140 | ~32 min | 600 | 1,800 |
| 30 | ~210 | ~48 min | 900 | 2,700 |
| 50 | ~350 | ~79 min | 1,500 | 4,500 |
> Estimates based on ~25 s per new card and ~10 s per review. Adding 50+ new cards/day is generally unsustainable — review debt compounds quickly and leads to deck abandonment within 2–3 weeks.
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How Big a Deck Do You Need?
| Goal | Words needed | Typical deck | Days at 15 new/day |
|---|---|---|---|
| English A2 | ~1,000 | 1,000 cards | ~67 days |
| English B1 | ~2,000 | 2,000 cards | ~133 days |
| English B2 | ~4,000 | 4,000 cards | ~267 days |
| English C1 | ~8,000 | 8,000 cards | ~533 days |
| JLPT N5 (Japanese) | ~800 | 800 cards | ~53 days |
| JLPT N1 (Japanese) | ~10,000 | 10,000 cards | ~667 days |
| HSK 4 (Chinese) | ~1,200 | 1,200 cards | ~80 days |
| Medical boards (Zanki-style) | ~20,000 | 20,000 cards | ~1,333 days |
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Typical Cases
Case 1 — GRE prep (900-card deck, 60 days):
New cards/day = 900 ÷ 60 = 15/day. Steady-state review load: ~105 reviews/day ≈ 24 min/day total. Comfortable for most schedules.
Case 2 — Medical boards (1,200-card deck, 70 days):
New cards/day = 1,200 ÷ 70 ≈ 17.1/day. Steady-state reviews ≈ 120/day → ~27 min/day. If that load is too heavy, extend the deadline to 85 days (≈14/day, ~22 min) or trim to the highest-yield 1,000 cards.
Case 3 — JLPT vocabulary (2,000-card deck, 120 days):
New cards/day = 2,000 ÷ 120 ≈ 16.7/day. Steady-state reviews ≈ 117/day → ~26 min/day. Leaves room to add grammar or kanji-reading cards without breaking the schedule.
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Common Mistakes
1. Ignoring the review snowball — Beginners add 30–50 new cards/day in week 1 and are shocked by 300+ reviews/day in week 3. The review count runs at roughly 7× the daily new-card rate at steady state.
2. Erratic pacing — 50 new cards one day and 0 the next creates review spikes that are impossible to sustain. A constant daily rate is what keeps the load flat.
3. No review cap — Set a maximum of 150–200 reviews/day in the deck options so a missed day doesn't bury you.
4. No priority within the deck — Learn the highest-frequency words first (frequency lists for languages, high-yield cards for medicine). If you run out of time, you'll have covered what matters most.
5. Non-atomic cards — Cards that ask 'Explain oxidative phosphorylation' take 45–90 s each, blowing up the time estimates. Best practice: one fact per card, ≤10 s per review.
Frequently asked questions
How many new Anki cards per day is realistic for most learners?
For adults with 15–30 minutes available daily, 10–20 new cards/day is the sustainable sweet spot. At 20 new/day you'll face ~140 reviews/day by week 3 (~32 minutes). Fewer than 5 new/day stretches the timeline excessively; more than 30 new/day without prior experience usually ends in abandonment from review pile-up within 3–4 weeks.
Is the formula really just total cards ÷ days?
Yes — the direct division is the core. Anki manages the review calendar automatically, so you don't schedule reviews yourself. What you can do is sanity-check the result against your available time: if the daily rate this calculator gives generates more review minutes than you can spare, extend the deadline instead of cramming more new cards.
How long does each new card take vs. each review?
A well-designed new card takes 20–35 seconds (including the '1 min + 10 min' learning steps of the SM-2 algorithm). A review of a mature card (interval >21 days) takes 5–12 seconds. That's why total session time depends more on accumulated reviews than on the new cards themselves — and why this calculator estimates time as (new × 25 s) + (reviews × 10 s).
What happens if I skip a day of Anki?
Missed reviews stack onto the next day — Anki does not redistribute them automatically. One skipped day at 20 new/day can mean 180–200 pending reviews at once. To recover: (1) cap daily reviews in the deck options (max ~200), (2) add zero new cards on the catch-up day, (3) resume the normal pace the next day.
Is FSRS better than classic SM-2 for managing the load?
Yes. FSRS (Free Spaced Repetition Scheduler), available in Anki 23.10+, models forgetting more accurately and cuts unnecessary reviews by roughly 15–40% versus classic SM-2 at the same retention. If you use modern Anki, enabling FSRS gets you the same goals with less study time.
How do I estimate the daily time the deck will take?
Use this estimate: (new/day × 25 s) + (reviews/day × 10 s) = seconds/day, where reviews/day at steady state ≈ new/day × 7. Example: 15 new/day → 15 × 25 + 105 × 10 = 375 + 1,050 = 1,425 s ≈ 24 minutes daily. This calculator runs that estimate for you automatically.
Does Anki only work for languages, or for other subjects too?
Anki works for any content that can be memorized as discrete units: vocabulary (languages, medical, legal, technical), pharmacology, anatomy, history dates, math and physics formulas, kanji, programming syntax. The only condition is that the material can be phrased as question–answer pairs.
What do I do if my deck buried me in a giant backlog?
The standard reset method: (1) suspend all cards overdue by more than 30 days, (2) keep only 'young' cards (<21-day intervals) active, (3) set new cards to 0 until the backlog drops below ~100 reviews/day, (4) resume new cards at 5/day. If the backlog exceeds 3 months, deleting the scheduling history and restarting is often more efficient than digging out.
How many vocabulary words do I need for fluency?
As a reference: ~2,000 words cover about 95% of everyday conversational English (B1 level). 5,000–8,000 words correspond to advanced fluency (C1). Japanese JLPT N5 requires ~800 words; N1, ~10,000. Chinese HSK 4 uses ~1,200 words; HSK 6, ~5,000. These figures tell you the deck size to enter in this calculator.