Makoto+ Lifetime Membership
Pay once. Get the magazine, the platform, the app, and everything we build next — forever.
$399 $299 once — like paying for three years of our top-tier Shogun plan, but it lasts a lifetime.
Lifetime is our Shogun tier, permanently. Shogun normally runs $99/year, so Lifetime pays for itself in three years — and Japanese isn’t a three-year hobby. It’s a lifelong one.
Prefer to count magazines? A new issue of Makoto is $9.99 on Amazon — $119.88/year if you buy every issue. The magazine alone covers the price in about two and a half years, and it’s just one piece of what’s included.
What you get, in plain English
Every Makoto magazine issue, forever.
Lifetime members get the complete magazine — past, present, and future:
- Every new issue, the day it drops — download the PDF, ePub, Anki decks, and sound files; read it on the web with full Sentence Explorer integration; or read it right in the app.
- All 100 back issues on the web — read and search every issue we’ve ever published, on any device.
The magazine keeps growing, too. Our first issue in April 2018 was “packed” at 39 pages. The latest issue (#101) tops 100 pages — all of it readable as an eBook, on the web, or in the app.
The full Makoto+ platform.
Weekly sentence breakdowns, shadowing practice, grammar deep-dives, haiku lessons, bonus lessons, Frank story episodes, podcast extras, and the Makoto+ Chatbot for live Japanese practice. Several new pieces of content posted every week.
The Sentence Explorer — every sentence explained, every kanji one click away.
Makoto+ Real Japanese Shorts.
Real Japanese videos — comedy, cooking, daily life — at native speed, from N5 to N1. Lifetime members get full access to every study tool on every video: synchronized transcripts with furigana and English, tap-any-word definitions, Word Bank saving, dictation and shadowing practice, comprehension quizzes, and exportable Anki decks with audio. Browse the videos.
Every course — current and future.
Every course on Makoto+ is included — Japanese Names, JLPT Kanji, Idioms, and more — plus every course we add going forward. We’re working on more.
The mobile app.
Makoto Japanese Explorer for iPhone, iPad, and Android. Sentence Explorer, Word Bank, your reading progress synced across devices. Lifetime members get unlimited access — and we’re adding new content regularly. Read the latest magazine in the app too!
A 20% reusable discount at TheJapanShop.com.
Reusable. Forever. If you buy from us regularly, this alone tends to pay for itself within a year or two.
Monthly freebies.
A new download every month — graded readers, vocabulary sheets, cultural deep-dives, printable PDFs, Anki decks, sound files. Yours to keep.
And whatever we build next.
We’re not done. The Sentence Explorer integration is rolling out across more content. The app is getting features. New courses, more interactive quizzes, more ways to connect the magazine to the lessons to the books to the tools. Lifetime means you get all of it, automatically, forever.
All 100 issues, April 2018 – June 2026. Read every back issue on the web — and download every new issue from now on.
Why we’re offering this.
When we started Makoto in April 2018, a few subscribers asked for a lifetime option right away. I said no. It didn’t feel right offering “lifetime” when I didn’t yet know if we’d still be doing this in a year, much less ten.
Eight years and one hundred issues later, it feels like we can. Makoto isn’t going anywhere. Yumi and I are still here, still putting each issue together by hand, and the platform around it has grown into something I’m genuinely proud of.
— Clay & Yumi
What members say
“I have every issue of Makoto (70 and counting) and they add so much to learning Japanese. The content is varied and interesting, and everything is broken down so that it’s easy to understand how Japanese sentences work and to get a feel for the language.”
— Geoff
“Well… I think MAKOTO+ is one of the most valuable set of materials for language learning I have ever met in my life! Why? Because it is complete, exhaustive, rich of interesting contents, easy to read and approach.”
— Andrea
“As an upper intermediate Japanese language learner living outside Japan, I enjoy the hard work Clay and Yumi are putting into Makoto+, including the monthly magazine and all the tools available online.”
— Annerose
“I love Makoto+. Shogun was my birthday present and it’ll be that every year!”
— Beatrice, Milano, Italy
(With Lifetime, Beatrice, it can be a one-time gift. 😉)
Three ways to pay
Same lifetime access either way — pick the option that fits your budget.
Have a current paid account (Samurai or Shogun)? Upgrade from your account page under “Change Plan” — your unused balance is credited automatically. If you subscribed through the iOS or Android app, that credit can’t calculate on its own. I check every Lifetime upgrade for any missing proration, but if you don’t hear from me quickly, please email me and we’ll credit you.
Common questions
What’s the difference between Lifetime and Shogun?
Functionally, none. Lifetime gives you everything in our top Shogun tier — but you pay once instead of every month. You also get any new features we add forever, including future Makoto magazine issues.
What if I miss this offer?
We may bring Lifetime back around Black Friday and occasionally through the year — but not necessarily at this price. $299 is the lowest it will ever be. In the meantime, our regular monthly and yearly plans are always available — Makoto+ isn’t going anywhere.
I’m already paying through the iPhone or Android app — what happens?
If you have a paid membership through the mobile app, you’ll need to cancel that manually in the App Store or Google Play after upgrading to Lifetime. We can’t cancel app-store subscriptions on your behalf — Apple and Google control those. Memberships purchased directly on the website are cancelled automatically when you upgrade.
Can I get a refund if I change my mind?
Yes — within 14 days, no questions asked. After that, the lifetime offer is final.
Is the price ever going to be lower than this?
No. It will never be cheaper than $299 — though we may raise it in the future. Lock it in now and you’re locked in forever, regardless of what we do later.
If Makoto has been useful to you over the years — if you read it, look forward to it, learn from it — the math is the math.
This is the moment.