Getting started

Ask Tomyo

Ask Tomyo is an assistant you can write to in English or in Chinese. It tells you how to say something in Chinese, explains a Chinese text or a word inside it, and checks a sentence you wrote yourself. Every answer comes with pinyin, a translation, audio and a word-by-word breakdown.

Where to find it

The assistant is marked by an orb. On the home screen it sits in the header, next to your level and day streak — on the website, on iOS and on Android.

The website also has an Ask Tomyo item in the left-hand menu. It is visible on every page of your account, so you can call the assistant without leaving a lesson or your dictionary.

What you can ask

There is no mode to pick: the assistant works out what you want from whether your question contains Chinese characters and how it is phrased. You can ask one question after another, and the answers stack up in a feed.

How to say it in Chinese

Write a sentence in English and Tomyo translates it the way people actually say it. You do not even have to phrase the sentence — describe the situation instead, such as “how do I ask a taxi driver to stop”. The answer is then not a translation of your question but the phrase you should say.

The assistant takes your HSK level into account: where the meaning allows, it uses words and grammar from your level and below.

What someone wrote to you

Paste a Chinese text and Tomyo translates and breaks it down. If a single word or particle is the puzzle, ask about it in English and include the word itself in characters: the assistant answers the question instead of translating everything around it.

Check your own sentence

Write a sentence in Chinese and ask whether that is how it is said. Tomyo either confirms it is right or gives a corrected version and briefly explains what was wrong.

The correction is minimal: your words and meaning stay, and only what was wrong changes. A conversational style and missing punctuation are not treated as mistakes.

What it costs

The assistant is free: it does not require a Plus subscription, and there is no separate limit on the number of questions.

What to do if…

Tomyo did not answer

Most likely the connection dropped or the answer did not arrive in time. Your question is not lost — it goes back into the field. Tap the orb to send it again.

Tomyo says the text is too long

The assistant is meant for a sentence or a few sentences, not a whole article. Split the text into parts and ask about them one at a time.

Tomyo misunderstood the question

Say plainly what you want: for example, add “is this right?” to your Chinese sentence. A question without Chinese characters is always read as a request to say something in Chinese — to learn what a word means, include the word in characters.