Help

How to play, and the questions people ask. Stuck? Ask the person who invited you, or get in touch through hello@myownlingo.com.

Getting started

Your account. A username and a password. Your username shows on the scoreboards.
Your level. Pick a CEFR level (A1 to C1) the first time you play Chinese (Mandarin). If in doubt, go low: every round moves it. Tap the level in the top bar to change it.
Playing. The games page lists 7 games with your best score in each. Practice and grammar are in the top bar.

A round is eight questions. Word Snap runs until your tenth mistake, Word Pairs until your third, and Word Grid until the board is clear or you've spelt three wrong words.
Score over 65% and the next round is a level harder; under 35% and it is a level easier; in between, it stays.
Every right answer counts towards your level, hint or not. The hint is free; a right answer on a second try still moves you up but scores half a point on the scoreboard. Leave a round halfway and the rest count as wrong.
When your level runs short of material, questions come from the next level along; the badge on each question says which.

Missing Word: A small word is missing from a sentence in Chinese (Mandarin): a particle like 的 or 了, a measure word, a word like 在 or 给. Pick the right one. Two tries.
Sentence Reorder: Tap the shuffled words of a sentence in Chinese (Mandarin) back into order. Three tries.
Pick the Meaning: A word in Chinese (Mandarin) and four meanings. Pick the right one. Two tries.
Type the Word: A meaning in English: type the word in Chinese (Mandarin), in characters or in pinyin. Tone marks or tone numbers (ni3 hao3) both count; right but for the tones still counts, and you see them. Two tries.
Word Snap: A word in Chinese (Mandarin) and a meaning: right or wrong? Against the clock; ten mistakes and it's over.
Word Pairs: Thirty tiles: fifteen Chinese (Mandarin) words and their meanings. Find the pairs. Three mistakes close the board.
Word Grid: Sixteen tiles of letters. A meaning comes up: spell its Chinese (Mandarin) word from the board and its tiles turn over. Clear the board. Three wrong words close it.

Each game remembers your answers item by item. Get one right three times in a row and that game stops asking it.
A mastered item comes back once after 30 days (marked "review"); right again, it goes for 90 days, then 365.
One miss and it is back in rotation. Answers after a hint do not count towards the streak.
The Progress page shows how far you are, game by game and level by level. "Start over" clears it.

Three games a day, drawn at midnight, the same three for everyone. Finish a round of each and the day is done; the score does not matter.
Streaks. Every day done adds one. Today stays open until midnight, so yesterday's streak is safe all day.

Flashcards. Pick a deck, a level and how many cards. Choose which side shows Chinese (Mandarin); "easy" puts the part of speech on the front.
Flip. Tap the card (or press space) and say whether you knew it (← →). A missed card comes back a few cards later.
Memory. Cards you know come back less often (1, 3, 7, 14, 30 days); cards you miss come back soon. Practice never touches the scoreboards.

The overall ranking averages each game's recent rounds, then averages the games you played, so every game counts the same.
Monthly. Each calendar month is its own race; the top of the ranking at the end of the month wins it.
Private scores. Turn them off the boards for everyone; they stay on your own pages and nothing is deleted.
Deleting. "Delete all my scores" removes every round you played in Chinese (Mandarin). Your level and practice stay.

Reading. Well-known stories retold at your level. Hover or tap an underlined word for its meaning; tap a sentence for its translation.
Reading aloud. "Read aloud" uses your browser's own Chinese (Mandarin) voice and lights up the sentence it is reading. Double-tap a sentence to start there.
Questions. Check what you understood at the end; tick the box to have them in Chinese (Mandarin) as well.

I was marked wrong but I was right.: Sentences that reorder into another correct sentence are kept out of Sentence Reorder, and Missing Word offers words of the same kind, but some context lets two answers work. Send the sentence through hello@myownlingo.com and it will be fixed.
A meaning looks wrong.: Let us know through hello@myownlingo.com; it will be fixed quickly.
Can I play on my phone?: Yes. Every page fits a phone screen, and adding it to your home screen makes it open like an app.