Tracking
Flashcards teach words in isolation. Reading teaches them in context, where they actually live. Every time you meet a word again inside a new sentence, your brain rebuilds it faster. Researchers call this contextual repetition, and it outperforms isolated memorization almost every time it's tested.
Lichtung automates it. There's no deck to maintain and no schedule to follow. You just read, and the app handles the rest. For tips on best practices for reading languages checkout our reading guide.
New
The first time you meet a word like "forest," it’s just a shape on the page. Lichtung highlights it blue.
Learning
Meet it a few more times (in this article, that novel, tomorrow's news) and the highlight fades shade by shade. Repetition is doing the work; you didn't lift a finger.
Familiar
Now the shape settles. You know it's coming before you read it.
Known
One day you read straight through it. The highlight is gone. Not archived, not quizzed: dissolved.
A course ends. A deck is finished or abandoned. Reading has no finish line: a word is simply closer to known every time you meet it. That's why tracking follows your reading instead of grading it.