Anki is already a powerhouse for spaced repetition, but add-ons take it to another level.
Whether you want to speed up reviews, customize the look, or add gamification, there’s an add-on for that. We’ve rounded up the best Anki add-ons and extensions to maximize your flashcard and studying experience!
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How to Install Anki Add Ons
Real quick: Before we dive into the best Anki add-ons, here’s how to install any that catch your eye!
- Open Anki and go to Tools → Add-ons
- Click Get Add-ons
- Paste the add-on code from AnkiWeb
- Restart Anki, and you’re good to go!
Need a quick walkthrough? This video tutorial has you covered.
Essential & Functional Anki Add Ons
These add-ons take Anki from basic to powerful, making your flashcard reviews smoother, smarter, and a little more fun!
FSRS (Free Spaced Repetition Scheduler) Helper
Anki’s default scheduling works, but FSRS makes it better. This add-on fine-tunes your review intervals for max efficiency — so you spend less time on what you already know and more on what needs work.
Speed Focus Mode
If you tend to overthink your flashcards, this add-on is for you. It keeps you moving by setting a time limit per card — forcing you to recall faster and stay focused.
Advanced Browser
Anki’s default card browser is… fine. But this add-on levels it up with better search, sorting, and filtering — so you can actually find what you need without scrolling forever.
Anki Brain (Anki ChatGPT)
Wish your flashcards could explain things to you? This add-on brings AI into Anki, generating summaries, answering questions, and helping you actually understand the material instead of just memorize it.
AnkiCollab
Team up with friends, classmates, or an entire study group! AnkiCollab lets multiple users edit and improve a shared deck in real time, so you’re always working with the best version.
AnkiHub
Tired of manually updating shared decks? AnkiHub syncs deck updates in real time, keeping your flashcards fresh with community improvements.
HyperTTS
Need pronunciation practice or just want your cards read out loud? HyperTTS turns your text into high quality AI-generated speech, perfect for language learners.
Advanced Review Bottom Bar
Anki’s bottom bar is pretty bare-bones. This add-on gives it a glow-up with more detailed stats, shortcuts, and buttons for easier navigation during reviews.
Fastbar
Sick of clicking through menus? Fastbar adds a sleek, customizable toolbar to streamline your Anki workflow — less clicking and more studying.
Life Drain
Make studying a little more fun (or stressful). This gamified add-on gives you a “health bar” that depletes when you get answers wrong.
Straight Reward
If you’re nailing consecutive answers, this add-on slightly boosts your intervals, reinforcing streaks of correct answers. (Also, most users suggest using either this or FSRS — but not both.)
Touch Screen
Brings AnkiDroid’s drawing and writing feature to desktop, letting you jot down quick notes during reviews. Just like AnkiDroid, your writing disappears after each review — perfect for temporary recall.
Visual, Text & Auditory Reinforcement
Sometimes you need more than just a right or wrong answer. This add-on adds animations, images, and sound effects for a little extra feedback!
Calculate New Cards To Do
Trying to balance your workload? This add-on helps you calculate how many new cards to introduce without overwhelming yourself.
Anki Progress Bar
If seeing progress keeps you motivated, this add-on adds a visual progress bar to show how far along you are in your review session!
Enhanced Cloze
Cloze deletions are already great, but this add-on gives you even more control over how missing words are displayed and revealed.
AwesomeTTS
Generate natural-sounding text-to-speech audio for your cards — perfect for language learners or anyone who prefers auditory reinforcement.
ImageResizer
Got a deck full of images that are way too big? This add-on lets you resize them directly in Anki for a cleaner look.
Anki Aesthetic Add Ons
If you’re spending hours in Anki, you might as well make it look good. These add-ons bring much-needed customization to the interface.
Looking for more ways to make your Anki setup look great? Don’t miss our round-up of the most aesthetic Anki backgrounds!
Custom Background & Image Icon
Breathe some life into Anki by swapping out the plain background for an aesthetic wallpaper of your choice.
Anki Redesign
A complete UI overhaul for Anki to make it look cleaner, more modern, and a lot less clunky.
Countdown to Events and Exams
Add a countdown timer to your dashboard so you always know how many days until your next big test!
Enhance Main Window
Another add-on to give Anki’s main window a mini facelift.
The King of Button Add Ons
Tweak and customize Anki’s buttons for a more personalized layout that fits your workflow.
Review Heatmap
Turn your study streaks into a GitHub-style visual heatmap to track your consistency over time!
Puppy Reinforcement
Who doesn’t want a cute puppy when they get a card right? This add-on adds puppy GIFs as a reward for right answers.
True Retention
Want to know if you’re actually retaining information long-term? This add-on tracks your retention rates and helps you tweak your study routine.
Colorful Tags (+Hierarchical Tags)
Organize your decks with color-coded and hierarchical tags, making it easier to find and filter your cards!
Image Occlusion Enhanced
Perfect for visual learners — hide parts of an image and reveal them one by one for an interactive recall experience.
Special Fields
Keep your shared decks updated without overwriting specific field — perfect for studying with classmates or accountability partners!
Which Anki add-on are you rushing to add? Any great extensions we missed? Let us know in the comments below!
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