You'll have your decks in folders and tags, a library you can filter and sort, and a way to put decks on hold without losing their progress.

What you need

• A Vocards account on the web, iOS or Android, with a few decks.
• A connection. Moving, tagging, deactivating and deleting decks are saved to your account, so most of these controls are grayed out while you're offline.

1. Open your deck library

On the web, open the page menu at the top left of the header and pick My Decks. On iOS and Android, open the Decks tab.

The library opens in the Folders view, sorted Due first, with decks shown as tiles. Whatever you change on this page is remembered on that device.

2. Put decks in folders

1. In the Folders view, click New folder next to the search field.
2. Type a name under Folder name. Under Location, the new folder starts in the folder you're in. Pick a color under Colour if you like.
3. Click Save.

To put a deck in a folder, open the deck's ⋯ menu and pick Move to…. Click a folder to go into it, then click Move here. At the top level the button reads Move out of folders, which takes the deck out of every folder. In the list layout you can also drag a deck onto a folder tile, or onto a folder in the sidebar on a wide screen.

Click a folder tile to open it. Its ⋯ menu has Rename, New subfolder, Move to… and Delete folder. Rename also lets you change the folder's color and location.

Deleting a folder never deletes what's in it. Its decks and subfolders move up one level. If a subfolder that moves up has the same name as a folder already there, a number is added to its name, as in "Spanish (2)". That also happens to a subfolder named like the folder you're deleting.

Note: On iOS and Android, tap the + button on the Decks tab and pick New folder. Inside a folder it reads New subfolder. Tap a folder to open it, and the back chip at the top to leave it. The ⋯ next to that chip is the menu for the folder you're in. To move a deck, pick Move to… in its ⋯ menu. The apps have no dragging.

3. Tag decks

A deck can have several tags, and one tag can go on many decks. Use them for anything that cuts across folders, such as "Exam" or "Travel".

1. Open a deck and click Add tag under its description.
2. Type a tag name. Pick an existing tag from the list, or click Create with your name after it.
3. For a new tag, pick a color and click Create again. The tag is added to the deck.

To take a tag off a deck, click the × on its chip. To rename, recolor or delete tags, open Manage Tags from the page menu or from the bottom of the tag list. Deleting a tag removes it from every deck. The decks stay.

Note: On iOS and Android, tap Add tag on the deck screen. Once the deck has tags, that chip reads Manage Tags. The chips have no ×: to take a tag off, tap it again in the sheet. Manage Tags at the bottom of the sheet opens the full tag list.

4. Change the view, filter and sort

Above your decks is a row of controls: the view menu, Filters, the sort menu and a button that switches between tiles and a list.

The views other than Folders list every deck wherever it's filed, with its folder shown under the name. In By tag, a deck with several tags shows up under each of them, and decks with no tag come last under Untagged. A number on Filters shows how many filters are on.

The language groups only appear once your decks use more than one language on that side, and the tag group once you have tags. To keep decks for two languages apart, see Learn two languages at once without mixing them up.

The search field looks through deck names, descriptions and folder names in every folder, whatever view you're in.

Note: On iOS and Android the controls are icon buttons in the same order, and the magnifier button opens search. In the filter sheet the language groups are Learning lang and Known lang, and the reset button is Clear filters.

5. Act on several decks at once

1. Open any deck's ⋯ menu and pick Select. That deck is ticked.
2. Click other decks to tick them, or click Select All to tick every deck on screen.
3. In the bar at the bottom, pick Move, Deactivate (Activate when every ticked deck is inactive) or Delete.
4. Click Cancel to leave without doing anything.

On iOS and Android, pick Select from a deck's ⋯ menu. In the list layout you can also long-press a deck.

6. Take a deck out of rotation

Deactivate a deck when you want to stop studying it for a while. Its cards and progress are kept.

• In My Decks, open the deck's ⋯ menu and pick Deactivate. In the list layout, the switch on each row does the same.
• On a deck's own page on the web, click Pause Learning. On a narrow screen that button shows only a pause icon.
• On iOS and Android, open the ⋯ menu on the deck screen and tap Deactivate. It's only there once the deck has cards.

The app calls this state "paused" in some places and "inactive" in others. It's the same switch:

On a deck tile, click or tap the Inactive badge to activate the deck again.

While a deck is inactive:

• It's left off Home and out of Home's due count.
• It's left out of Mixed review and out of practice rounds.
• You can still study it from its own page, and add cards to it.
• Its cards keep their review dates. Cards that fall due while it's inactive are waiting when you bring it back.

7. Delete a deck

1. Open the deck's ⋯ menu and pick Delete Deck.
2. Confirm with Delete. The deck and its cards disappear.
3. A message with Undo appears and stays until you close it. Click Undo to bring the deck back with its cards.

On the web, the confirmation says the action can't be undone. The Undo in step 3 still works. On iOS and Android the confirmation says you can undo it.

Note: Deleting several decks at once from the selection bar has no Undo, on the web or in the apps. If you might want a deck back, delete it on its own.

8. Clean up words you have in more than one deck

The same word added to two decks is two cards on two schedules, so you review it twice. Vocards finds these across your whole library: cards with the same front in the same language pair, whatever deck or folder they're in. Cards you've discarded don't count.

When you have any, a banner at the top of My Decks says how many words appear more than once. Click Review to open Duplicate words. If you dismiss the banner, it comes back when a new duplicate turns up. While you have duplicates, a link next to the sort menu (under the deck list on a narrow screen) opens the review even after you dismiss the banner.

The review sorts words by language pair into two groups:

• Same word: the copies' translations agree. These start ticked, keeping the copy you know best (one in an active deck comes first). Click another copy to keep that one instead. With more than 20 such words, they're folded into one line until you click Review each.
• Same spelling, different translations: the translations share no meaning, as with billete saved once as "ticket" and once as "banknote". These may be two different words, so they start unticked.

Keep all, don't ask again keeps every copy of a word and stops it coming up here. It moves to Kept on purpose at the bottom, where Check again puts it back in the review.

When you're happy with the ticks, click the Discard button in the bar at the bottom, which shows how many copies go , and confirm with Discard. The extra copies leave your sessions and go to each deck's Discarded list, where you can restore them. The message that follows also has Undo. To remove them for good, with their review history, click Delete instead… instead. That can't be undone.

On iOS and Android: the banner is on the Decks tab, with a Review button. While you have duplicates, Find duplicate words at the end of the library opens the review. The review works the same way.

What you'll see

• Folder tiles show how many decks they hold and how many cards are due, counting their subfolders.
• Inactive decks are dimmed and carry the Inactive badge.
• Once you have more than six decks and no folders, a "Tidy up your decks" card suggests making one. Dismiss hides it on that device. While the duplicate-words banner is showing, this card waits.

Limits

• Folders nest up to 5 levels deep.
• Folder names can be up to 60 characters, and two folders in the same place can't share a name.
• Tag names can be up to 30 characters.
• Select All only ticks the decks on screen, so a filter or an open folder limits it.

If something goes wrong