u/King_bulah07

Whether you’re completely new to memory palaces or looking to organize larger collections of information, here are a few tools worth exploring.

This isn’t meant to be a ranking—just a collection of resources that many people in the community have found useful.

🏛️** Pocket Palace (iOS**)

If your goal is to build and organize multiple memory palaces, Pocket Palace was designed specifically for that purpose.

Features include:
-Create multiple palaces
-Organize rooms and loci
-Keep large topics structured
-Designed for long-term learning

Good for:
-Languages
-Professional certifications
-School subjects
-Personal knowledge management

Full disclosures: I’m the developer of Pocket Palace, and I’ve included it here alongside other tools that serve different purposes.

📚 Anki

One of the most popular spaced-repetition flashcard apps.

Excellent for:
-Vocabulary
-Medical school
-Exam preparation
-Reviewing facts over time

Many people combine Anki with memory palaces, using palaces for major concepts and Anki for detailed review.

🧠 Obsidian

A knowledge management tool rather than a memory app.

Great for:
-Connected notes
-Linking ideas
-Research
-Planning large learning projects

Some people use Obsidian to outline material before placing it into memory palaces.

✍️** Paper & Penci**l

Still one of the best tools available.
-Sketch your palace.
-Number your loci.
-Draw your route.

Sometimes simple works surprisingly well.

🗺️** Google Maps / Street Vie**w

Need a new palace?
Street View can help you explore neighborhoods, museums, campuses, and cities that can later become memory palaces.

🏡 Your Own Home

Don’t overlook the most powerful tool you already have.
The places you know best are often the easiest to remember and make excellent first memory palaces.

Which Should You Use?
There isn’t a single “best” tool.
It depends on what you’re trying to learn.

For example:
-Memory Palace → Concepts, speeches, frameworks, structured knowledge
-Anki → Facts, vocabulary, formulas, spaced repetition
-Obsidian → Organizing notes and research
-Pocket Palace → Managing and expanding multiple memory palaces over time

Community Recommendations
Have you found another app or resource that’s helped you learn memory palaces?

Leave a comment and I’ll update this list so it becomes a useful starting point for beginners.

Anyone have any ideas on what makes their memory tick?

I’ve posted a lot about how the MP works and what to do but others may have their own thoughts about it

If someone wanted to seriously learn memory techniques, where would you tell them to start?

They would be looking for recommendations that cover topics like:
-The Method of Loci (Memory Palace)
-Visualization techniques
-Associative memory
-Competitive memory
-The history of mnemonic systems
-Ancient Greek and Roman memory methods
-Modern neuroscience of memory

Here are a few that I would recommend:

📖 Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer
A great introduction to the world of competitive memory and mnemonic techniques.

📖 The Art of Memory by Frances A. Yates
A classic that explores the history of memory systems from Ancient Greece through the Renaissance.

📖 How to Develop a Perfect Memory by Dominic O’Brien
Practical techniques from an eight-time World Memory Champion.

📖 Unlimited Memory by Kevin Horsley
A beginner-friendly guide with lots of practical exercises and examples.

📖 Remember It! by Nelson Dellis
Focuses on visualization, association, and everyday memory improvement from another memory champion.

Questions for the community:
-Which book had the biggest impact on how you think about memory?
-Are there any hidden gems that deserve more attention?
-If you could recommend just one book to a complete beginner, what would it be and why?

I’d love to build a community reading list that newcomers can use as a starting point.

I’ve been thinking about is why memory palaces work so well in the first place.

Our brains don’t store memories like files in a computer. Instead, memories are built from networks of connections.

For example, if I simply tell you:

“Apple.”

You might remember the word for a few seconds.

But if I tell you:
A house-sized apple crashes through your roof, splattering juice across the room while worms sing opera from inside it.

Suddenly you’ve created a scene.

That single image contains:
-A location
-Movement
-Color
-Emotion
-Sound
-Surprise
-Meaning

Your brain has many more “hooks” it can use to retrieve that memory later.

This lines up with what psychologists call dual coding—the idea that information is remembered better when it’s encoded both verbally and visually.

Research also shows that distinctive, unusual, and emotionally engaging events are generally remembered better than ordinary ones.

Memory palaces take advantage of this by combining:
🏠 Familiar places
🎨 Vivid imagery
🚶 A consistent path
🔗 Strong associations

Instead of trying to memorize isolated facts, you’re building an experience.

Question for the community

When you create memory images, what makes them stick the best? Movement? Humor? Emotion? Size? Violence?

Something else entirely?

I’d love to hear what techniques have worked best for you.

When people talk about memory palaces, the focus is usually on visual imagery.

But I’ve always found it interesting that certain smells can instantly bring back memories from years ago.

Examples:
-Fresh-cut grass
-Chlorine from a swimming pool
-Coffee brewing
-Old books in a library
-Ocean air
-A particular perfume or cologne

Sometimes a smell can bring back an entire scene with almost no effort.

That got me wondering:

Do you intentionally use smell in your memory palaces?

For example:
Associating cinnamon with a concept
Imagining the smell of gasoline, smoke, coffee, or flowers
Using scent as an additional retrieval cue

Or do you rely mostly on visual imagery?

Bonus Question
What’s a smell that instantly transports you back to a specific memory?

For me, it’s fascinating how a single scent can sometimes trigger a stronger memory than a picture.

One thing I’ve noticed when discussing memory palaces is that people seem to visualize very differently.

Some people describe vivid, movie-like images.

Others see only vague impressions.

Some don’t seem to visualize at all and instead rely on spatial awareness or associations.

For example:
If I place a giant red dragon on my couch, I don’t always “see” every detail perfectly.

But I still know:
-Where it is
-What it’s doing
-Why it’s memorable

So I’m curious:

How do you visualize your memory palaces?
-Do you see detailed images?
-Do you see blurry images?
-Do you rely more on concepts than pictures?

Have your visualization skills improved with practice?

Bonus question:
What’s your favorite trick for making an image impossible to forget?

I’ve noticed that building a memory palace is often the easy part.

The harder part is coming back to it consistently.

Many people start with enthusiasm, build a palace, memorize a few things, and then slowly stop reviewing or expanding it.

For those who have successfully maintained memory palaces long-term:
- How often do you review them?
- Do you schedule reviews or revisit them naturally?
- How many active palaces do you maintain?
- Have you ever abandoned a palace and started over?

Personally, I’m interested in how people keep large collections of palaces organized and useful over months or years.

What has worked best for you?

Most examples online focus on things like:

Shopping lists
The planets
Random words
Decks of cards

But I’m curious about real-world applications.

What’s the largest thing you’ve successfully memorized using a memory palace?

Examples:
A language
A certification exam
A university course
A speech
A textbook
Historical dates
Medical terminology
Professional knowledge

A few questions:
What were you memorizing?
Approximately how many loci did it require?
Did you use one palace or multiple palaces?
How long were you able to retain the information?

I’m especially interested in hearing from people who have used memory palaces for learning rather than memory competitions.

Memory palaces are one of the oldest memory techniques in the world, but there aren’t many active communities dedicated specifically to learning and practicing them.

I recently started r/HowToMemoryPalace as a place to discuss:

• Building memory palaces
• Memorizing languages, exams, and professional knowledge
• Mnemonics and loci systems
• Memory competitions and techniques
• Real-world examples and walkthroughs

Whether you’re completely new or have been using memory palaces for years, you’re welcome to join the discussion.

If your goal is to remember information for months or years, which approach do you prefer?

Memory Palace

Pros:
Extremely memorable
Fast recall
Strong for speeches, lists, concepts, and structured knowledge
Doesn’t require constant review once established

Cons:
Takes effort to build
Harder to organize at scale
Can be difficult for beginners

Anki / Flashcards

Pros:
Easy to start
Spaced repetition is proven
Great for large amounts of information
Popular among students

Cons:
Can feel repetitive
Review load grows over time
Doesn’t always build strong mental connections

Personally, I suspect the best answer may be a combination of both.

For example:
Memory Palace for major concepts
Flashcards for details and reinforcement

What has been your experience? Memory Palace? Anki? Both?

Something else entirely?
If you’ve used both, which one helped you retain information the longest?

When most people first try a memory palace, they make the same mistake:

They try to memorize the information directly.

Example:
Front Door → Mercury
Couch → Venus
TV → Earth

The problem? Those images are boring. Instead, make every image ridiculous.

Example:

Front Door
A giant thermometer (Mercury) melting through the door.

Couch
A bottle of Venus perfume exploding across the living room.

TV
The Earth smashing through the screen and rolling across the floor.

The stranger, louder, larger, and more emotional the image is, the easier it becomes to recall. A good memory palace should feel more like a cartoon than a filing cabinet.

Question
What’s the most ridiculous memory image you’ve ever created that actually worked?

One of the things I love about memory palaces is that they can be built from almost anywhere.

I’ve heard of people using:
Childhood homes
Schools and universities
Shopping malls
Cruise ships
Video game maps
Entire cities
Fantasy worlds from books and movies

The stranger the palace, the more memorable it often becomes.

So I’m curious:

What’s the weirdest memory palace you’ve ever used?

Bonus questions:
What was the palace?
What were you memorizing?
How many loci did it contain?
Did it work well long-term?

Welcome to r/HowToMemoryPalace.

If you’ve heard that memory palaces can help you remember information but aren’t sure where to begin, this guide is for you.

Step 1: Choose a Familiar Location

Pick a place you know well:
Your house
Your apartment
Your school
Your workplace
A favorite walking route

The more familiar, the better. For this example, let’s use a house.

Step 2: Pick 5 Locations (Loci)

Walk through the house in a fixed order.
Example:
Front Door
Couch
TV
Kitchen Sink
Refrigerator

Always keep the same order.

Step 3: Create Ridiculous Images

Let’s memorize the first five planets:
Mercury
Venus
Earth
Mars
Jupiter
Place an image at each location.

Front Door
A giant thermometer (Mercury) melting the door.

Couch
A bottle of perfume (Venus) exploding across the couch.

TV
A spinning globe (Earth) crashing through the screen.

Kitchen Sink
A red Martian (Mars) washing dishes.

Refrigerator
Jupiter, the size of a beach ball, blocking the fridge door.

Step 4: Take a Mental Walk

Close your eyes.
Walk through the locations in order:
Front Door → Couch → TV → Sink → Refrigerator
Recall the image at each stop.
The images become retrieval cues.

Step 5: Expand

One room can hold several loci.
Several rooms form a palace.
Several palaces can store entire subjects.

Examples:
Languages
Engineering
Medicine
History
Professional Certifications
Speeches
Personal Knowledge Systems

Community Challenge
Reply below with:
The location you chose.
Your first five loci.
Something you successfully memorized.
Questions are welcome.

I’ve been experimenting with memory palaces for technical subjects (engineering, certifications, languages, etc.) and I’ve noticed something interesting.

For me:
1-4 loci = easy
5-8 loci = still very reliable
9-12 loci = starts getting crowded
12+ loci = recall quality begins dropping

I’m curious how other people structure their palaces.

Questions:

1. How many loci do you put in a single room?

2. Do you have a maximum before creating a new room?

3. Have you successfully used memory palaces to learn an entire book, course, or certification?

Bonus: If you’ve built a palace with 100+ loci, how did you organize it?

Been working on refining a process for me to actually get this to work for me - I am currently studying some new skill sets for work.

I wanted to know if anyone has actually been able to get thru an entire book, study guide or course using this method loci/memory palace? What was the outcome?

Edit: Bonus: has anyone found an app that actually helps organize palaces, rooms, and loci? Most of what I find seems focused on flashcards rather than spatial memory