How to Use Learning Mode in MemoForge: Study All Your Decks with FSRS

Learning Mode is MemoForge's built-in study session: a full-screen view of your flashcards with FSRS scheduling underneath. You can study one deck, all decks in a project, or everything you have at once — no switching between decks mid-session. This guide covers how to start a session, what each button does, and how to tune the scheduling to your memory.

If you're new to the algorithm, the Learning Mode feature page explains the FSRS ideas, and our FSRS vs SM-2 guide goes deeper into desired retention and how forgetting works.

Starting a Session

There are a few ways in, and they differ in what you study:

• The Study button on your dashboard (the center button in the bottom navigation) starts a session with due cards across all your decks.
• On a project page, the Start Learning button opens a dialog where you pick which of that project's decks to include, or study them all together.
• On an individual deck, the Study button runs a session for just that deck.
• The Statistics page has a Start studying button that jumps straight into a session.

A session runs until the due cards in your selection are done. If you leave partway, hit Save & exit — every rating is saved as you go, so you pick up exactly where you left off.

Inside a Session

Reveal the answer

Tap Show answer (or press SPACE) to flip the card. Before you rate it, the interface previews what each rating would do to the card's next interval, so you can see the consequence of your choice.

Rate honestly

Four buttons, and they map to how well you actually knew it:

• Again — you didn't remember it. The card is scheduled for relearning, and it's re-queued so you'll see it again before this session ends.
• Hard — you remembered it, but with real effort.
• Good — you remembered it normally.
• Easy — it was effortless.

Keyboard shortcuts: 1–4 rate, SPACE reveals. Made a mistake? Ctrl/⌘ + Z undoes the last rating within a few seconds.

The rating is what feeds the FSRS scheduler, so honesty matters more than speed. A common trap: pressing Hard when you actually forgot the answer. FSRS treats Hard as a successful recall, so a forgotten card gets an interval that's too long. Press Again when you forget.

Handle problem cards in the session

• Edit any card on the spot if the wording is bad.
• Downvote a card that's fundamentally weak (a separate thumbs-down from the Again rating) so you can review bad cards later.
• Leech rescue: if you've failed a card eight or more times, MemoForge flags it as a leech. Pro subscribers get an AI-suggested rewrite — a mnemonic, a simpler explanation, an example sentence, and a reformulated back — which you can accept or keep the original; free accounts see the leech warning with an upgrade prompt. It's a suggestion, not a verdict.

Typed-answer mode

Want a harder test than recognition? Toggle type mode and type your answer before the card is revealed. Free accounts get 5 typed-answer reviews per day; Pro subscribers get unlimited.

Custom Study

When your normal session is done, the Custom Study option lets you go beyond the due queue:

• Study More New Cards — learn extra new cards beyond your daily limit (they count as today's reviews but don't eat into tomorrow's limit).
• Review Due Cards — a standard session for whatever is currently due.
• Review Ahead — study cards due in the coming days, useful for clearing a busy day ahead of time.

You pick a count from 1 to 100 (10 is the default). Review Ahead is the one to use sparingly: it shifts spacing, so it's for planning around busy days, not a daily habit.

Tuning the Scheduler

Open Settings in the app and find Spaced Repetition Settings (under Study preferences). The defaults match the standard FSRS setup:

• Desired retention — slider from 70% to 97%, default 90%. This is the big lever: higher retention means more reviews and better recall; lower means fewer reviews and more forgetting. Anki's guidance is to keep it at or near 90%, and below 97%.
• Learning steps — default 1, 10 minutes: the gaps between reviews of a new card while it's still in learning.
• Relearning steps — default 10 minutes: the gap after you press Again on a review card.
• Daily new cards — default 20: the cap on new cards per day.
• Daily reviews — default 200: the cap on reviews per day, which protects you from surprise walls of due cards.

Adjust one thing at a time and study with it for a week before changing another. Desired retention is the one most people ever need to touch.

Tracking Progress

The Statistics page shows your retention rate across decks, your current streak, a review heatmap, and a forecast of upcoming due counts. After each session you also get a summary: cards studied, recall percentage, session time, and a breakdown of your Again/Hard/Good/Easy ratings. That breakdown is the fastest way to notice a problem — if Again is climbing, the deck (or your daily new-card limit) probably needs attention.

Studying in Anki Instead?

Learning Mode is built in, but if your study life lives in Anki, every deck can be exported as an Anki package (.apkg) and imported on desktop or mobile. The import guide walks through it.

The Short Version

Start from the Study button, reveal, rate honestly, and let FSRS do the scheduling. Keep desired retention at 90% unless you understand the tradeoff, keep new cards within your daily limit, and use Again when you forget. That's the whole system — and it works across all your decks in one session.