I’m studying for my Internal Medicine shelf using Anki and will have STEP 2 in late June 2025. My minimum recommended retention is currently 0.94 (3650-day simulation), but I’m wondering if keeping it above 0.90 might be overkill.
Higher retention means better long-term recall, but I don’t want to overload myself with unnecessary reviews for a fast-moving rotation.
Does anyone have experience with this? Should I lower it closer to 0.85-0.90, or is 0.94 worth maintaining for the shelf + STEP 2?
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Hello,
When using FSRS, the recommended retention rate is 0.90.
The AnKing recently released a new video on the ideal Anki and FSRS settings. I highly recommend watching it to get the most out of the algorithm:
AnKing - Ideal Anki & FSRS Settings
I hope this clarifies things for you! Let me know if you need further elaboration. 
Hey Marcos, thanks for the insight!
I do remember this from the AnKing video—he recommended setting retention to 90%, but also mentioned using the recommended interval from the FSRS simulation along with Anki’s built-in settings.
My current minimum retention from the 3650-day simulation is 0.94, so I was wondering if lowering it to 0.90 would be fine or if sticking to the simulation recommendation would be better for long-term recall (especially for STEP 2).
From your experience, do you think 90% retention will be enough, or should I keep it higher for better long-term retention?
Appreciate your help! 
Keeping it 0.90 is totally fine and it’s enough for almost every goal with memorization in Anki, but if 0.94 doesn’t end up with a heavy workload for you, you can keep it like that!
You can just leave it 0.94 and if it turns out to be too much for you, then you can lower it to 0.90!
Agree with what Marcos has said. I strongly recommend keeping it at 90%. Maybe 92% as a maximum, but 88-90% will be very effective as well
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