Importing from Anki

You can bring an Anki deck into MemGym, with its cards, cloze deletions, subdecks, tags, pictures and sound.

Getting the file

A shared deck from AnkiWeb: on the deck's page, click Download. That saves an .apkg file, ready to import as it is.

Your own deck from the Anki app: choose File → Export…, pick Anki Deck Package (.apkg), and export one deck at a time. Leave Include media ticked if you want its pictures and sound. Files from older and newer versions of Anki both work.

Importing it

Go to Cards → Import / export, tap Import Anki (.apkg) and pick the file. When it finishes, a summary says what came in and anything that was left out.

Importing an updated copy of the same deck later updates its cards rather than adding them twice. Cards you've already added to practice stay there, with their schedule and history.

Anki can also export plain text (.txt). Use Import Anki (.txt) for those. They bring the text only, and go straight into practice.

What happens to your cards

  • They arrive in a new collection named after the deck. Subdecks become folders. A deck with no subdecks, where every card has exactly one tag, gets a folder for each tag instead, so you can switch one tag's cards off or on in Cards → Collections. Other tags come along and show on each card's own page.
  • They go into your backlog, not straight into practice, so a 5,000-card deck won't bury you. In Cards → Backlog, add a whole folder at a time, one card at a time, or a set number each day.
  • The first field becomes the question and the second the answer. Any other fields, such as notes or a reference number, go into the card's comments, the same as the Comments box when you write a card. Each is labelled with its Anki field name, and they show under the answer once you reveal it.
  • Cloze notes become one card per blank, as in Anki. Formatting becomes plain text.
  • New cards come in the deck's own order. If that makes them too easy, as with times tables, set the collection's New cards to Shuffled in Cards → Collections.
  • You practise them like any other card. Before the answer shows you pick Low, Medium or High, then score it Missed, Partial or Nailed. These aren't Anki's Again, Good and Easy: if you got it right, that's Nailed.
  • Your calibration history starts empty. It's built from predictions you make in MemGym, and an Anki file doesn't contain any.

Pictures and sound

Pictures appear on the card, and sounds get a play button. Anything on the answer side stays hidden until you've made your prediction.

  • Kinds MemGym keeps: JPEG, PNG, GIF and WebP pictures; MP3, M4A, AAC, WAV, Ogg and WebM sound.
  • Limits: 10 MB per file, and 2 GB for your whole account.
  • What's left out: a file of another kind, a file over either limit, or one that fails to upload. The card still comes in without it, and the summary counts what was left out.
  • Private: only your signed-in account can load your pictures and sound, even on a collection you've made public.

Not supported yet

  • Your Anki review history and due dates. Cards arrive fresh in your backlog.
  • Image Occlusion cards.
  • Custom card styling. The content comes in; the look doesn't.
  • LaTeX and MathJax. Maths comes in as plain text.
  • "Type in the answer" cards come in as ordinary cards.
  • Whole-collection .colpkg files. Export one deck at a time instead.

If you need one of these, tell us at ops@intixa.com.

Anki is a trademark of its respective owner. MemGym is independent: it is not affiliated with, sponsored by or endorsed by Anki. MemGym reads Anki's file format so you can bring your decks with you.