Cangjie practice: from zero to fluent
The most effective way to learn Cangjie: learn where the radicals are on the keyboard, learn the auxiliary shapes, understand how to decompose characters into radicals, then practice with the lessons and articles, and look up anything you get stuck on in the dictionary. If you practice about 20 minutes a day, you can achieve basic fluency in one to two months. If you continue on for six months, you should be able to surpass 30 characters per minute. Below is a path from zero to fluent, with a link at each step to start right away.
1. Learn where the radicals are on the keyboard
There are 24 Cangjie radicals on the keyboard. Learn a few at a time and practice with simple characters until the layout is second nature. See the radical table, or practice the keys in the lessons.
2. Learn the auxiliary shapes
Each Cangjie radical represents one or more shapes. Besides its basic shape, a radical also covers a family of auxiliary shapes (輔助字形): these may be squashed, rotated, or altered variants. They may also be semantically or conceptually related to the radical. For example, the 水 key also covers 氵 (the three dots in 江 and 河) and 氺 (the strokes at the foot of 泰 and 求). Knowing these is key to being able to type Cangjie. Practice the auxiliary shapes in the lessons.
3. Learn how to decompose a character
Next, learn how to break a character into radicals, that is which shape the first code is, and how many codes a character has. For example, 你 breaks into 人, 弓 and 火, and 好 into 女, 弓 and 木. Practice decomposition in the lessons.
4. Practice the common characters and articles
Now put it together. The lessons drill the most common characters in order, and the article practices let you type real texts. This is where most of your practice happens. Practice the common characters or try an article.
5. Look up the Cangjie code for any character
Stuck on a character? Look up its Cangjie code and get a step-by-step breakdown for any Chinese character. You can search multiple characters at a time. Open the dictionary.