Alternatives
Products that do what A dictionary of untranslatable words from around the world does
Have you ever come across a word in another language that just perfectly captures a feeling or concept you can't quite express in your own tongue? I created coolforeignwords.com because I wanted to share those "aha" moments with fellow language lovers, and created a website to make those words easier to find. So, whether you're a word nerd, a traveler, or just curious about the world, please feel free to visti my website. Try it out and please share your feedback. It's still very early stage, so would love any advice. Thank you
- 1WC
2013 · wordsforthat.com
- 2CC
I began this in late September purely on the whims of frustration with thesaurus.com, which does not bother to focus the input box! So I made my own site that focuses the input box. And because I wanted a thesaurus where I could type just the term in the address bar (eg type carefulwords.com/word) to get my results. It is very rough around the edges right now. There are far too many synonyms, which themselves are only organized alphabetically. I hope to take the site in a more inspiring direction over time than merely synonyms. Perhaps euphemisms, or other poetic uses from the past, or…
2022 · carefulwords.com
- 3AW
I’ve long thought that the Word of the Day was a wasted genre. The goal should be to give you words you can use; to enrich your understanding of words you already know; or at least to use words to tell you something neat about the world. Instead, what you usually get is words that will never be used in conversation, held up as curios. Some examples from Dictionary.com’s daily email: thewless, balladmonger, vagility, contextomy. These words are... not useful. I’ve always thought I could do better. My friend Ben recently created a daily puzzle game, called Bracket City, launched here on HN…
2025
- 4IC
As non-native English speakers, we're often advised to avoid overusing intensifiers like "very". This is a simple app to find synonyms of "very x" phrases that are not always possible to find using a standard thesaurus. Built it using OpenAI, FastAPI, and MongoDB (to cache the results).
2024 · insteadofvery.com
- 5PD
Hi! Wanted to share the project I really wanted to have. TLDR; this app lets you create your own list of words and you get a Duolingo-like experience (kind of, still needs a lot of features) practicing those words in their context. My English is not the best but not the worst either. But I realized I can't boost it up after a certain level! In my belief, in order to truly learn a language, you need to be exposed to that language often. Vocabulary is the key factor here if you really want to improve in any language. My experience is that when I read a book to improve my English vocabulary, I…
2025 · github.com
- 6
- 7WT
2018 · eunoia.world
- 8IM
Hi HN! In the last couple of weeks I've been working on Cranki: Cranki = Crosswords + Anki. (It's a stupid name tbh, haha) I like doing crosswords in Spanish (to learn vocab) but none of the apps out there allowed me to use my own list of words that I come across. So I built one instead. It's entirely client-side. No server, no database, no accounts, etc. Your words and stats are stored in local storage. I built this for myself but let me know if you like it!
Apr 2026 · cranki.app
- 9TA
Hello HN, Introducing VocabGenii.com, my online vocabulary game. It is the first product from my company, Genii, Inc., that brings innovative, engaging new learning experience to the market by leveraging web 2.0 and social networks. Currently, we are running a 10K Challenge -- anyone scoring 10,000 points before the contest ends (March 24 04:00 GMT) will get 3-Month unlimited play. Exceptional performance would also be recognized in our 10K Hall of Fame with limited edition trophies! We're hiring! If you have disruptive ideas on language learning and online education, and possess…
2011
- 10LP
Hi! I am doing a learning project, attempting to build an imperative language (and interpreter). The end product will be useless for others, I just want to learn and better understand how to build imperative languages. :) If someone else shares this interest and want to give some good hints on good resources I would be grateful. Currently I am looking at an awesome text by Bob Nystrom. All suggestions and tips on resources are most welcome. I am very much a beginner in this, but I find this topic very fascinating. Mail me or post links here! Cheers! You can try a beta version Online at…
2020
- 11GA
In the dark old days when I was uninspired and couldn't come up with a name for a project I'd hop onto my old pal Google Translate and see if a keyword associated with my name "sounded cool in German" If it did, and the domain was unused I'd scoop it up and use it. This process took a while, I'd try German, French, Russian, Armenian, Latvian, etc trying to find something cool that wasn't already being used. So I built http://www.catelus.com/ It translates your keyword into more than 30 different languages and checks if your-word-in-german.com and your-word-in-polish.com are…
2016
- 12HW
A small site created to see the hell world example in many different languages. I got tired of sites which only showed 10-30 languages. I'm sure there are some inaccuracies (some languages are not I languages per se).
May 2026 · languages.jdunn.dev
- 13IW
As hard as I tried, I didn't find a modern language learning book that's either very academic, or like "master a language with my super-magic great method in 3 months". So I dug into the academic research, tried many techniques myself, saw what worked, wrote a book for learners of any language and any level, and made it free without ads. Today, finally, a 2 years-long project ends. I hope it helps anyone. Book's here: https://thehardway.guide/ Cheers
2023
- 14IM
English is my second language. From my experience, I learnt that developing your vocabulary is a long and arduous process. Traditionally, learners used flashcards (or their digital incarnations). I wanted to build something more engaging and more effective in building your vocabulary. DictionaryGames is aimed mostly at ESL (English as a Second Language) students, but I am hoping it might be fun for any English language lovers. The project is in BETA, it is free, and no registration is required. I am looking for feedback to improve it. If you comment, please indicate if you are a native…
2025 · dictionarygames.io
- 15
- 16SY
Hi HN, I built Lengpal, a simple language exchange platform where two people get instantly matched on video to practice their native and target languages. There’s a timer built in so both sides get equal time to speak. I created this because I wanted something beyond passive apps like Duolingo. Something to actually speak with real people without the hassle of scheduling or chat fatigue. Right now we are testing the concept with a waitlist. We’ve collected 77 emails so far from Reddit and IndieHackers. I would love your feedback before launching the MVP. Site:…
2025
- 17IB
The idea is to get from a starting word to a target word by creating a list of words to go in the middle. You can only change one letter at a time. Yesterday's words: https://twitter.com/ChangelistGame/status/1518695582151237632 Today's game: https://changelist.rocks/
2022
- 18WZ
Hi HN! This is a word search game I launched in the beginning of this year - didn't get much traction then, but it's been posted around a bit (right now getting some traffic from kottke.org) and now has over 12,000 words found! Now that it's a little more filled out I figured I'd share it again. Really enjoying seeing what everyone is making on it - it appears most people start by just adding a few words to the big clump in the middle, then adding to other people's projects (or ruining them) and finally working on their own little concepts. My favorite is the kitty to the north. Hope you…
Jan 2026 · words.zip
- 19IB
Hey HN! Halfway through moving to Canada and whilst my conversational French gets me by, I'm absolutely rubbish when someone rattles off phone numbers at full speed (quatre-vingt-dix-neuf anyone?). So I built a virtual pet that thrives on correctly answered number challenges. 20-second drills throughout the day: get them right and Lexie grows, get them wrong and it gets a bit sad (but never dies, this isn't the 90s). Speak, type, or tap your answers. Would love any feedback/bugreports. Or just rant about how the Belgians sensibly say "nonante-neuf" whilst we're stuck with…
2025 · apps.apple.com
- 20IM
Wiktionary is probably the most comprehensive dictionary available, but I've often found the official website a bit overwhelming, especially on my phone. When I just want a quick definition, Wiktionary frequently starts with a long Etymology section. This is my attempt to address that. Kwiktionary prioritizes definitions first, like a traditional dictionary. It's designed with smaller screens in mind and aims for a clean UI. The frontend is a Next.js app (using Material UI). The definitions are served by an API I wrote using FastAPI, currently running on a e2-micro instance (let's see how…
2025 · kwiktionary.vercel.app
- 21PC
I did not get much feedback last time I shared [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33286893] I built phraisely as an AI assistant to look up words by their descriptions. Since my last posts, I've added: - free trial with *no signup* required - improved quality of the model and results. - improved usability. Example usage: if you query for "being home at night watching Netflix on the couch", results can contain "relaxing" and "unwinding" but also "binge-watching" since I mentioned Netflix. Bonus points when I get some slang in the results (e.g. couch-potatoing). Remember: (i)…
2022 · phraisely.com
- 22
Declaude▲7I had to develop a course related to quantum chemistry and unfortunately, Claude just kept writing it in its own very annoying claude-speak. It actually cost our team a lot of time and tokens to wrestle it to just speak like a normal human. We used skills, as well as initial prompts and subagents to make sure that all of the tics were gone, but there was one too many times where it just wouldn't fix itself despite telling it in the prior prompt! I made speak-english based off of https://github.com/gvzdv/claudish-to-english/commits/main/ and it runs a qwen…
12d ago · speak-english.tenken.co
- 23KT
Hi HN! I built this tool, because Large Language Models are hallucinating their asses off and I wanted to test just how bad it is with a topic I know best - myself. I'm sure there are other egos out there who google themselves and essentially this is the new googling yourself. It's early beta, so lots of room for improvement of course.
2023 · haveibeenencoded.com
- 24KL
I'm both a Japanese learner and an indie developer. Throughout my journey of learning Japanese (currently living in Japan), I've deeply felt the challenge of memorizing words — learning them only to forget, wanting to speak but finding myself tongue-tied. Why I Made This As someone who relies heavily on visual memory, I understand the power of turning abstract concepts into visual forms. You know that feeling when you're walking around and spot something interesting — maybe a beautiful seasonal poster, a curious shop name, or even just a package design that catches your eye? Those little…
2025 · apps.apple.com
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