i am currently taking japanese but i kinda regret not taking spanish since it is more we’ll know. and btw i can speak fluent chinese and write in chinese. so i am just not sure if i should have taken spanish instead?
How many years have you taken Japanese? It might look bad if you take two years of Japanese and two years of Spanish in high school, but it might look less bad if you take one year of Japanese and three years of Spanish.
i am planning to take 3 years of japanese. then taking one year of ap chinese
It really depends on the college. Most colleges want two years of high school level language. IOW, Japanese 1 and 2. But if you are applying to Harvrd, they will want four years. Other colleges might ask for three.
The language you take is irrelevant. What may matter is that you go as far as you can with it, if that is what a college wants. This info can easily be found by looking at a college’s website.
No; they care about how many years you’ve taken it.
They want you to reach the highest possible level. Depending on the colleges you’re aiming for, level 3 (or 4?) Japanese + AP Chinese would actually be terrific. Remember that colleges like students to stand out and since Spanish often is the’ default choice’ you could stand out for picking Japanese, especially for your flagship’s honors college and colleges such as Yale, Penn, Dickinson, Spelman, or Middlebury where foreign language study matters. Having to languages at a good level is even better.
However taking Chinese and Japanese is a way to stand out, not a hook.
Generally speaking " should I do what everybody does" is not the way of thinking about college admissions. 
thank you!
thank you you so much!
In addition to the 4 year “rule”, I’d say Japanese is rarer and thus potentially more interesting than Spanish or French.
yeah true!
It doesn’t matter what language you take, but you should take only one. I cannot understand why you would take AP Chinese instead of AP Japanese. It would look much better to focus on Japanese. You can still take the AP Chinese test and submit the score.
in my school ap japanese is a very hard class and not many do so well on the ap exam
Meet with the AP Chinese teacher, and get their advice about taking the class. I expect that reading, writing, and speaking the language are not necesarily sufficient for doing well on the exam. Happykid was advised to wait until junior or senior year to take the AP classes for her first language because of social issues. The teacher had found that many freshman and sophomore students did not feel comfortable in classes with seniors. In the end, Happykid took Latin instead, and got college credit for her language with a CLEP exam.
Your plan to take Japanese as your real foreign language looks good to me. If AP Japanese is the only option after Japanese 3, then wait until you finish Japanese 3 to decide about AP Japanese.
Yes Spanish is an immediately more useful language in most of the US, but after studying Japanese, and knowing Chinese, as an English speaker Spanish will be a snap to learn. Much of the grammar is similar, and there are many common word roots. In many ways it will feel like you are just learning a different dialect of English.