Reviews of Spanish Online Language Learning Resources
- 17 Minute Languages Review: I Wouldn’t Recommend Using It
17 Minute Languages
Summary
17 Minute Languages is a language-learning program that uses spaced repetition and native-speaker audio to teach a wide variety of languages. In our opinion, the courses aren’t very engaging; the courses we tried included significant errors and didn’t offer any language-specific explanations. There are leaderboards for comparing your progress with other users and a language forum that’s available after four days of use.
Native speaker audio is the only thing that impressed me in the courses I tried; mistakes and glitches were many.
Explanations are lacking, which I found made some material misleading.
I think there are far better ways to spend your time and money studying a language.
I Like
- It uses native-speaker audio.
I Don’t Like
- I came across several bad translations.
- I didn’t find any helpful explanations.
- Site navigation wasn’t easy or enjoyable for me.
- I didn’t find the exercises engaging.
Price
The Beginner’s Course is $59.95 and the Complete Package is $97. For the whole package and all languages it is $197. There is a free 48-hour trial.
Superlearning technology? Fluency in 50 hours? Courses in 80 different languages? This is either the greatest language-learning resource of all time or it’s a painfully overpriced language site making absurd claims. Let’s find out.
…17 Minute Languages Review: I Wouldn’t Recommend Using ItRead More »
- Assimil Review — A Fresh Look at a Longstanding Resource
Assimil
Summary
Assimil is a French company that has been selling language-learning resources since 1929. Assimil materials are available as books, CDs, and downloadable e-courses; there are a variety of available course types, and instruction is based on interacting with phrases in the target language. The popular Sans Peine or, With Ease, courses are for absolute or false beginners that would like to reach the B2 level, but we think you’ll need to incorporate some other study materials to make this happen.
The language materials are reliable, the audio is high quality, and the program is fairly easy to use after a bit of practice.
Assimil is chock-full of explanations and thorough translations for all material, but you might need more to reach the advertised B2 level.
There are cheaper resources out there, but Assimil provides super solid instruction for the price.
I Like
- The audio quality is great.
- The culture notes add a lot of value.
- There are plenty of grammar explanations, but they aren’t a focus.
I Don’t Like
- The mobile app isn’t super intuitive.
- The pronunciation feedback method could be better.
- The exercises aren’t especially engaging.
Price
Prices vary by course. The Spanish e-course is €49.90, the Spanish With Ease book (no audio) is €26.90, and the Spanish With Ease Superpack is €74.90
Assimil Review — A Fresh Look at a Longstanding ResourceRead More »
- Babbel Review – Nothing Flashy, But Good, Trusted Courses At Reasonable Cost
Babbel
Summary
Babbel is an online language-learning platform with over 1 million active users. It’s available on the web, for iOS, and for Android. The app aims to get learners to a conversational level as quickly as possible through the use of a variety of exercises and spaced repetition for review. The courses are well put together and relatively inexpensive; there are 14 different languages available.
It’s well-designed and the content is immediately useful.
The material provided is effective and covers a lot, but isn’t ideal for advanced levels.
The price is relatively low for what’s offered, but you’ll have to purchase each language separately.
I Like
- The content is practical for real-life use
- It’s easy to use
- The lessons are fairly short
I Don’t Like
- The exercises can get repetitive
- The review exercises don’t include grammar concepts
- Speech recognition isn’t the best way to learn pronunciation
Price
Babbel uses a recurring subscription model and offers a 20-day money-back guarantee. Price per month depends on the length of the subscription and only includes access to one language.
Monthly – $14.95/mo Every 3 Months – $12.65/mo Every 6 Months – $11.15/mo Every year – $7.45/mo
The prices listed here are for customers in the United States; they otherwise vary by region.
Babbel Spring Sale! Get 60% off on Babbel subscriptions. See details on the website. Offer ends on 3/17/24.
What is Babbel?
With over 1 million active users, Babbel is one of the more popular language-learning platforms out there. Since it became available in 2007 it’s been expanded to offer curriculum-based instruction for 14 different languages on the web, iOS, and Android.
…Babbel Review – Nothing Flashy, But Good, Trusted Courses At Reasonable CostRead More »
- Babbel Spanish Review – A Solid Option for Value Seekers
Babbel Spanish
Summary
Babbel is an online language-learning platform with over 1 million active users. Babbel Spanish aims to get you to a conversational level as quickly as possible through the use of a variety of exercises and spaced repetition for review. The courses are well put together and relatively inexpensive.
It’s well-designed and the content is immediately useful.
The material provided is effective and covers a lot, but isn’t ideal for advanced levels.
The price is relatively low for what’s offered.
I Like
- The content is practical for real-life use
- It’s easy to use
- The lessons are fairly short
I Don’t Like
- The exercises can get repetitive
- The review exercises don’t include grammar concepts
- Speech recognition isn’t the best way to learn pronunciation
Price
Babbel uses a recurring subscription model and offers a 20-day money-back guarantee. Price per month depends on the length of the subscription and only includes access to one language.
Monthly – $14.95/mo Every 3 Months – $12.65/mo Every 6 Months – $11.15/mo Every year – $7.45/mo
The prices listed here are for customers in the United States; they otherwise vary by region.
Babbel is an online language learning platform that offers courses in various languages, including Spanish. Other than Rosetta Stone and Duolingo, Babbel is one of the most well known Spanish learning apps around. The Babbel Spanish course is designed to help learners acquire and improve their proficiency in the Spanish language through interactive lessons and practical exercises.
…Babbel Spanish Review – A Solid Option for Value SeekersRead More »
- Baselang Review – Super Great Program If You Can Carve Out Enough Time to Learn Spanish
Baselang
Summary
Baselang offers unlimited Spanish classes for $179/month. It’s much more than just a tutoring service though as they also have an excellent curriculum, along with elective lessons and assessments. I was really impressed with Baselang. Anyone with enough time and money to fully utilize the service should strongly consider using it.
The curriculum is extensive but not meant to be worked through alone.
You can follow their curriculum, have casual conversations, or do whatever you’d like to in the classes.
If you use it enough, it’s absurdly good value.
I Like
- The classes are truly unlimited.
- Scheduling lessons is extremely flexible. Several times I schedule a class less than 5 minutes before it began.
- The curriculum is well-structured and extensive.
- The teachers were good and catered the lessons to my preferences.
I Don’t Like
- There aren’t any teachers from Spain.
- The internet connection could occasionally be a problem.
- If you don’t have enough time to study, it’d be a poor choice.
Price
There are two programs – one for learning Real World Spanish and the other for intensive accelerated course Grammarless. The Real World program costs $179 per month, and the “Zero to Conversational in a Month, Guaranteed” Grammarless course is $1200. You can try Baselang out for one week for only $1. If you sign-up using the link below, you’ll get $10 off your first month.If you end up purchasing a plan and later decide that it’s not for you, Baselang will pay you $20 as an apology for wasting your time.
ALR Readers receive $10 off first month.
Learning Spanish was difficult for me. I did basically everything wrong.
…Baselang Review – Super Great Program If You Can Carve Out Enough Time to Learn SpanishRead More »
- Busuu Review: Some Courses Are Better Than Others
Busuu
Summary
Busuu is a digital language-learning app with over 90 million registered users. The resource offers vocabulary and grammar practice through short, self-paced study exercises. It also has a social aspect that allows users to get writing and pronunciation feedback from native speakers. It is available on the web, iOS, and Android.
The layout is great, and the quality for non-Asian languages is decent, but there were significant errors in the Chinese course.
It has some good explanations but doesn’t often offer much in the way of in-depth explanations.
Busuu is relatively inexpensive, but there are more thorough and efficient resources out there.
I Like
- The layout is easy to use and engaging
- The conversation lessons are especially useful
- The social feature is great
I Don’t Like
- Translations aren’t provided for some exercises.
- The Chinese course is low-quality.
- The grammar explanations and practice could be better.
Price
Premium Subscriptions
One month: $13.95
Six months: $50.70 ($8.45/month)
One Year: $40.70 ($3.48/month)What Is Busuu?
Boasting a user base of over 90 million, Busuu is a heavyweight in the digital language-learning landscape. It was launched in 2008 and has remained a popular and relatively low-cost option for language learners.
…Busuu Review: Some Courses Are Better Than OthersRead More »
- Chatterbug Review: Self-Study + 1-1 Classes – Does It Work?
Chatterbug
Summary
Chatterbug is a language learning platform designed with the aim of bringing together the convenience of digital learning apps and the value of one-on-one speaking practice. It was founded in 2016 and currently offers courses in German, Spanish, and French. Some of its features are available on iOS and Android; the full version is available for desktop.
The Live Lessons are great, but the other practice activities are somewhat limited and the interface isn’t very intuitive.
The Live Lessons provide quality practice, and there are good grammar explanations, but reading and writing practice are limited.
It isn’t super cheap, but the Casual and Serious plans could be worth it if you like the platform.
I Like
- The Live Lessons are engaging and structured.
- Scheduling Live Lessons is super easy and flexible.
I Don’t Like
- The interface is cluttered on desktop.
- The reading and writing practices are limited.
- There were errors in the reading material.
Price
The price of the recurring monthly subscription varies according to the number of Live Lessons you take each month.
Lite Plan, 1 lesson/month: $21.65/month Casual Plan, 4 lessons/month: $81.18/month Serious Plan, 8 lessons/month: $151.53/month Ultimate Plan, unlimited lessons: $432.95/month
Subscribers can purchase extra lessons each month for around $20/lesson.
Aside from enrolling in a course at a language school, there are two popular routes to take in learning a new language: find a tutor, or try out a digital language app.
…Chatterbug Review: Self-Study + 1-1 Classes – Does It Work?Read More »
- Clozemaster Review: Limited Focus But Fun Way To Grow Vocab
Clozemaster
Summary
Ideal for people who are already at an upper beginner/intermediate level, Clozemaster will help you build your vocabulary and learn new words and sentences in context. While you won’t learn much grammar or improve your speaking and writing much, it is great at what it does and the videogame aspect makes it fun and addictive to work though. Although the exercises are all pretty much identical, there are various ways in which you can increase the difficulty and Clozemaster’s free account is almost as good as the Pro User one.
Very easy to use with thousands upon thousands of sentences for you to work through, Clozemaster’s main exercises are well-designed though some features are a bit hit and miss.
Although you aren’t given any explanations, Clozemaster’s huge database of sentences allows you to learn words in context.
The free version offers a ton of value, but for those who use Clozemaster regularly, it may be worth upgrading to a Pro account.
I Like
- There is an insane number of words and sentences for you to learn, and you’re exposed to them within the context of a sentence.
- Just using the free account you are sure to learn a lot with only some extra (and undoubtedly useful) features being included in the Pro plan. This makes learning accessible to everyone.
- Lots of languages available to learn, and you can do so from a wide range of languages, making it very useful for non-native English speakers or those who want to study two languages at once.
I Don’t Like
- A couple of features such as the Cloze-reading and the speaking exercises seemed like they could have benefited from a bit more thought and effort put into them.
- There is no real progression and you are basically given an endless array of different words and sentences to work through and the various exercises are all pretty much identical.
- Sentences are sourced from
Price
The free version is very useful, but you can upgrade to a pro account for $8/month or $60/year.
Having never heard of Clozemaster before and having no idea what it was all about, I was immediately taken by its videogame-looking aesthetics and fun fill-in-the-missing-words exercises.
…Clozemaster Review: Limited Focus But Fun Way To Grow VocabRead More »
- Coffee Break Spanish Review – Are The Paid Courses Worth It?
Coffee Break Spanish
Summary
Coffee Break Spanish offers some really good free lessons available as podcasts. Additionally, they sell premium courses with extra materials on their website. For most people, there probably isn’t enough extra material included in the premium lessons to make it worth paying for the courses as they’re pretty expensive. This review will look at the free audio lessons, as well as the premium content.
It feels like you’re sitting in on a Spanish class.
Takes you from the very basics to at least an intermediate level.
The free lessons are amazing value but the paid courses are a bit expensive.
I Like
- They offer a comprehensive, well-structured, and free audio course.
- Lots of detailed explanations of vocabulary and grammar with lots of explanations.
- The lessons start fairly slowly but build up to where a lot of Spanish is used in later seasons.
I Don’t Like
- I wish there were more extra materials included or the price were lower for the paid courses.
- It’s primarily an input based course and you’ll need to practice speaking and writing Spanish more on your own.
- It doesn’t have a lot of the interactive exercises as some other resources.
Price
The audio for all of the lessons is completely free but the extra materials cost money. The 40 lesson package is $124.
Find all of the audio lessons for free on Itunes.
Prior to writing this review of Coffee Break Spanish, I’d already tried out lots of courses to study Spanish, such as News in Slow Spanish, Fluencia, Rocket Spanish, SpanishPod101, Baselang, Babbel, and a few others.
…Coffee Break Spanish Review – Are The Paid Courses Worth It?Read More »
- Cudoo Review — I Wouldn’t Even Use it if it Were Free
Cudoo
Summary
Cudoo is an online learning platform that offers courses in over 160 languages. The platform also offers courses teaching soft skills and other professional development courses. Certificates are available upon course completion, and courses are provided to libraries and non-profits for free. We feel that the quality of the language courses is quite low, and that the prices are relatively high.
It’s nice to have native speaker audio, but I personally found the course to offer very little learning potential.
The course didn’t cover everything listed under “Course Content” and offers no explanations.
This course is way overpriced in my opinion. I wouldn’t even use it if it were free.
I Like
- Audio by a variety of native speakers.
I Don’t Like
- I wanted more explanations
- Practice opportunities felt severely limited
- I found the material unengaging
- Content doesn’t build on itself logically.
Price
Price varies by course, from $4.99 to $24.99, with language bundles costing up to $199.
This seems like a reasonable list of goals, depending on the meaning of “…and more!” even if it is a little bit light for the $25 price tag.
…Cudoo Review — I Wouldn’t Even Use it if it Were FreeRead More »
- Drops App Review – Decent As A Supplementary Resource
Drops App
Summary
Drops is a phone app for iPhone and Android that covers 33 languages. Daily games test the user on thousands of vocabulary words, and many of these words are ideal for everyday use. Drops has an entertaining, user-friendly interface, but it also lacks grammar lessons, and it works better for some languages than others. For anyone looking to supplement their vocab lessons, this app is worth considering; however, the free version might be more worthwhile than the paid version.
Though cute and easy to use, some visuals are hard to distinguish.
Drops will teach you thousands of words and phrases, from transport and hobbies to astronomy and spices. Some languages, such as Japanese, have extra modules for culturally specific vocabulary.
The free app is a great supplementary tool to help round out your vocabulary, but the paid app doesn’t offer many useful extras.
I Like
- The daily reminders keep me accountable.
- If you already know a word, you have the option of swiping up and removing it from your lessons.
- Though the app works better for some languages, the sheer amount of languages is a plus.
I Don’t Like
- It can be difficult to tell certain images apart, which means you’ll likely identify them incorrectly during your review.
- Some of the categories seem to include random, unrelated words.
- In languages where a noun’s grammatical gender or case isn’t obvious from the article, you won’t learn that information.
- Drops only teaches you vocabulary, not grammar.
Price
A monthly subscription costs $9.99, a yearly subscription is $69.99, and a lifetime subscription is $159.99. You can use the app up to five minutes every ten hours for free.
I’d previously heard about Drops on Reddit, where it achieved rave reviews and some pointed criticism.
…Drops App Review – Decent As A Supplementary ResourceRead More »
- Duolingo Review: Useful But Not Sufficient – 2 Language Learners Test It (With Video)
Duolingo
Summary
Duolingo is a super popular free language-learning app. It’s available for desktop as well as mobile and offers over 90 different language courses in over 20 different languages — there are currently 35 languages with English instruction. The Duolingo approach is gamified and easy to use, but the bite-sized lessons don’t offer much in the way of in-depth practice. The Duolingo tag line is “Learn a language in just five minutes a day.”
It’s easy and fun to use, but some pronunciation and grammar instruction is of low quality, especially for Asian languages.
The app works well for learning the basics, but there’s little speaking practice and grammar instruction is limited.
It’s a lot of content for free, but you’ll need to use supplementary resources.
I Like
- The short lessons are ideal for quick, convenient practice
- The game-like features make the exercises engaging and fun
- The community aspect is motivating
I Don’t Like
- There’s no opportunity to create your own sentences
- Grammar instruction isn’t part of the lessons
- Text-to-speech audio is sometimes low quality
Price
Duolingo is totally free. Duolingo Plus offers a few additional features and is available for:
$12.99/month (paid monthly) $6.99/month (12-month subscription)
Their family plan is $119.99 a yearWhat is Duolingo?
Duolingo is one of the most popular language-learning programs out there. It’s been on the scene since 2012 and offers instruction in 35 different languages. It even offers courses in three constructed languages (perfect for brushing up on your Esperanto or High Valyrian).
…Duolingo Review: Useful But Not Sufficient – 2 Language Learners Test It (With Video)Read More »
- Earworms Review – A Unique Idea But Lacks Substance
Earworms
Summary
Earworms is a unique language resource that relies on audio lessons mixed into music. The theory is that you will find the music catchy and thus remember your lessons easily. The whole idea behind Earworms is the psychological theory of memory association. You would associate some information with the music and thus remember it easily. However, the music used in these lessons will not appeal to everyone, at least it didn’t for me. Moreover, the lack of visual aid and no exercises to assess your skills make it harder. I would only recommend this for people who have failed to learn through other online resources or perhaps someone looking to learn a few phrases before a trip.
With a lack of exercises and visual aids, I can’t really say that it will prove to be a useful resource.
All the lessons are comprised of various phrases that they think will be useful for anyone willing to learn French. Unfortunately, they’re too shallow and poorly structured.
With such low utility, it is important to have a low-price tag. Fortunately, they have followed this idea and thus you won’t be losing out too much if you opt for this.
I Like
- The repetition of the phrases
- Some of the tracks aren’t half bad
I Don’t Like
- Tracks aren’t as catchy as I expected
- Lack of visual aids
- Complete absence of a testing system
Price
Each volume can be purchased as an mp3 download for £10.42 or £31.26.
When I first heard of Earworms, I was quite intrigued mostly because I know what it’s like to get a song stuck in my head. Compared to annoying lyrics, getting a new language stuck in there sounds pretty appealing.
…Earworms Review – A Unique Idea But Lacks SubstanceRead More »
- Fluencia Review – My Experience Trying It Out
Fluencia
Summary
Fluencia is one of the better online Spanish courses I’ve come across. The course content is very well designed including tons of detailed explanations and exercises to practice what you’ve learned. While some similar courses are more gamified and less challenging, Fluencia is more challenging and less game-like. While I like Fluencia quite a bit, you’ll probably want to get more speaking practice elsewhere.
It’s obvious that a lot of thought and planning went into making these lessons.
The cultural and grammar lessons stood out as being exceptionally thorough.
It’s a good course and affordable for most.
I Like
- You’ll have actually needed to have learned the content to answer the exercises correctly.
- Everything is explained clearly with a lot of attention spent on the details.
- Recordings are done by native Spanish speakers with various accents.
I Don’t Like
- You’ll want to get more speaking practice by working with a tutor.
- You may also want to supplement your learning by listening to Spanish podcasts.
Price
1 month costs $14.95 12 months costs $95.40 24 months costs $166.80
Most people studying Spanish have probably come across SpanishDict.
… - Fluent Forever App Review – Lots Of Potential But Not There Yet
Fluent Forever App
Summary
The Fluent Forever mobile app is a language learning program currently available in eight languages. The approach it takes is based on the methodology described by Gabrial Wyner in his book, Fluent Forever. It uses flashcards and a spaced repetition algorithm to help the learner create meaningful connections with the language and commit language items to long-term memory. It’s best for people who are able to dedicate ample time and supplementary resources to learning a new language.
I noticed some spelling errors in the language I was learning. The activities aren’t super intuitive.
Pronunciation is explained very well, but I was hoping for some grammar explanations as well. Some features are still in development.
The price is reasonable, and the time spent using the app is productive.
I Like
- Creating my own flashcards was usually easy, fun and memorable.
- The pronunciation activities were enlightening and practical.
- Using the same sentence to learn multiple words got me speaking longer sentences quickly.
I Don’t Like
- I wanted to have more control over what I practiced and when.
- Creating flashcards was sometimes time-consuming and difficult.
- There are no explanations for grammar points.
- There’s no offline functionality, and the app is only supported on mobile devices
Price
$9.99/month when paid on a monthly basis. $53.94 for a 6-month subscription ($8.99/month) $95.88 for a 12-month subscription ($7.99/month) $167.76 for a 24-month subscription ($6.99/month)
My first introduction to the world of Fluent Forever was a TEDx talk done by its Founder, Gabriel Wyner.
…Fluent Forever App Review – Lots Of Potential But Not There YetRead More »
- FluentU Review — More Expensive than the Competition
FluentU
Summary
FluentU is a language-learning platform that uses real-world videos and interactive subtitles to create an immersive learning experience. The videos take on a variety of forms, including commercials, music videos, interviews, and more. Accompanying quizzes give users the chance to practice language used in videos. FluentU offers videos in nine different languages and is available for iOS, Android, and on the web. Most of its content is beyond the beginner level, but it has videos for learners at all levels.
It’s very straightforward and easy to use, though not especially visually pleasing.
There is a wide variety of videos, but they’re short and disconnected. They also aren’t suitable for absolute beginners.
It is not the most complete way to study a language.
I Like
- The site is easy to navigate.
- Interacting with subtitles is easy.
- The videos are authentic and tied to practice activities.
- Exercises recognize Chinese and Japanese characters.
I Don’t Like
- Flashcards use robotic text-to-speech audio.
- Writing practice is limited, speaking practice is nonexistent.
- Practice activities aren’t very interesting.
- There’s no easy way to filter content by region.
Price
After a 14-day free trial, users can purchase one of two subscription options. Subscriptions grant access to all FluentU languages.
Monthly Subscription: $30/month
Annual Subscription: $360/year
FluentU Review — More Expensive than the CompetitionRead More »
- Fluenz Review – Academic Approach With Thorough Explanations
Fluenz
Summary
Fluenz is a language learning software that is available on most devices and offers offline functionality. Its primary objective is to simulate the one-on-one tutor experience with the use of video tutorials that break down the language you’re learning. There are ample explanations of language concepts in English, and the instruction is very thorough. It’s designed for the user with a bigger budget that’s looking for an in-depth and serious learning experience.
The activities are easy to use and very effective, but they can be a bit dry.
Extremely thorough. Frequent video tutorials and podcasts provide in-depth explanations and lots of practice.
Maybe not the fastest way to learn a language, but there’s a great deal of content. Made for those who prefer an academic approach.
I Like
- I found the thorough explanations to be very helpful.
- The video tutorials were engaging and added a lot of value.
- The podcasts are great for more passive practice.
I Don’t Like
- The pace of the activities can be slow.
- Some of the activities feel too repetitive.
- It’s expensive.
Price
Except for Mandarin, each language is available in five levels of difficulty. The full five-level course is $408 (currently discounted at $378). The Mandarin course contains three levels of difficulty and is available for $322 (currently $308). For each language, you can buy a smaller bundle of levels based on your ability.
Fluenz Review – Academic Approach With Thorough ExplanationsRead More »
- Glossika Review – Not Cheap But Useful
Glossika
Summary
Glossika has learning resources for over fifty languages that impressively range from Armenian and Czech to Icelandic and Tagalog. While not suitable for absolute beginners, lower intermediates could use the resource to familiarise themselves with sentences in their language of choice using Glossika´s intuitive approach. Listening to native speakers and repeating what they say can help learners to improve their comprehension skills and spoken fluency. While it is amazing that so many languages are included, learners would have to use numerous other resources alongside it. The cost is unjustifiably high.
The audio recordings are well made but other aspects could be improved
Glossika covers an impressive number of languages but their method requires you to intuitively learn
Polyglots may find the price to be fair but for most language learners it’s not
I Like
- There are lots of languages available, including many that are rarely covered by other resources.
- The subscription gives you access to all of the languages making it possible to study one language and review another at the same time.
- It will force you to speak the language which will improve your confidence and prosody.
I Don’t Like
- As all of the languages cover the exact same material, the diversity of the languages and cultures are reduced to a simple formula with no cultural context involved in their teaching.
- There are a fair amount of errors in the materials.
- The cost is excessively high compared to other resources.
- There are no explanations of grammar.
Price
You can try out Glossika´s learning method for free with their week-long trial. Their basic subscription is $16.99 a month. The monthly subscription costs $30.99 a month. The annual subscription costs $24.99 a month and will set you back 299.88$ in total.
Click the link below to save $5 on a subscription to Glossika.
Few resources cover as many different languages as Glossika does. Because of this, I was excited to try it out and see what it’s like to use.
… - Grammar Hero Review – I Like It A Lot, But Wish It Were Cheaper
Grammar Hero
Summary
Grammar Hero is a product from Olly Richards, the creator of I Will Teach You A Language. It follows the story-based method of teaching languages, but this time with a focus on the most difficult grammar points. You start out by reading a story and the grammar point is underlined, later you learn the rules, then you re-read the story with explanations, and finally you’ll practice using the grammar point to express your thoughts and opinions. It’s a comprehensive method that’s meant to help you internalize the grammar.
The stories are unique and interesting, while highlighting the grammar points.
Covers the most challenging grammar in each language.
I wish it were cheaper so that more learners can take advantage of it.
I Like
- The stories are different for every language.
- Enjoyable to read, clear audio recordings, and more interesting than other ways to study grammar.
- Focuses on only the most challenging grammar points.
I Don’t Like
- It’s pretty expensive.
- The final “Activate” section is just a worksheet. It’s useful but hardly exciting.
Price
It costs $197 to purchase Grammar Hero in each language. There’s also a 30-day money back guarantee.
Olly Richards is the creator of the very popular blog, I Will Teach You a Language. He speaks 8 languages and provides a ton of good advice to language learners.
…Grammar Hero Review – I Like It A Lot, But Wish It Were CheaperRead More »
- Gritty Spanish Review: The Stuff Other Resources Don’t Teach
Gritty Spanish
Summary
Gritty Spanish is a resource for learning real-world Spanish with audio lessons. The lessons employ voice actors from various Spanish-speaking countries and the dialogues are very informal and realistic. Transcripts in both English and Spanish, along with notes on certain language items, are provided to help with your study. It’s available on the web, for iOS, and for Android.
The audio recordings and transcript translations are of high quality.
The explanations are great, but there isn’t any structure or evaluation.
More expensive than some other resources, but high quality.
I Like
- There is a wide variety of accents.
- Culture-specific language points are helpful.
- The material is lively and engaging.
I Don’t Like
- There are no evaluation exercises.
- There isn’t much structure.
- Very limited grammar explanation
Price
There are different options for subscribers. Basic starts at $29.99. Beginnings start at $34.99. The starter pack is $64.99. An orginal pack starts at $44.99. While Part 2 costs $49.99. The advanced combo pack is $94.98. To get all the packages it is $159.99. The original censored package is $35.99.
When I started taking Spanish classes in high school, I had no idea that I would eventually end up getting a Bachelor’s degree in the subject. I was sure I’d study chemistry or something, but nothing quite held my interest like Spanish.
…Gritty Spanish Review: The Stuff Other Resources Don’t TeachRead More »
- HelloTalk Review – Make Friends & Practice Languages
HelloTalk
Summary
HelloTalk is a mobile app for language learners interested in language exchange. It facilitates communication between native speakers and those learning their language with the use of built-in language tools. It also offers audio lessons in 10 languages as part of a separate subscription.
There’s an active community of dedicated learners, but you’ll have to do some searching.
The app is easy to use and the language tools are helpful, but you could end up relying on google translate.
Both the basic and VIP membership provide great value. The paid audio lessons probably aren’t worth it however.
I Like
- It’s exciting to practice communicating with real people
- The built-in language tools are helpful
- It’s easy to pick up and put down whenever you like
I Don’t Like
- It’s too easy to rely on google translate
- It can be hard to find good partners
- The paid audio lessons probably aren’t worth it
Price
The basic features of HelloTalk are free. Audio lessons require a separate subscription after a short trial period.
HelloTalk VIP is available for:
$6.99/month and $45.99/year or $175.00 for lifetime access
Learning a new language when you’re nowhere near other speakers of that language can be tricky. For example, I’m currently in Nepal and trying to learn Italian. I don’t exactly get a lot of opportunities to practice Italian here.
…HelloTalk Review – Make Friends & Practice LanguagesRead More »
- HiNative Review: Useful But Not Exceptional Q&A App
HiNative
Summary
HiNative is a Q&A app for language learners that want to have questions answered by native speakers. It’s available for iOS, Android and desktop, and it has over three million registered users. A free version is available that offers the basic features of the app.
The app is pretty basic, but it works.
Many users are very helpful, but not all questions receive intelligent responses.
The basic functions of the app are available for free, but you’ll need to pay for audio or video features.
I Like
- The community is active. Most of my questions received quick responses.
- The points system is rewarding.
- The free version is very useful.
I Don’t Like
- Many of the questions in my feed were unanswerable.
- The community could be better.
Price
The basic features of HiNative are free to use. A premium subscription is available for $9.99/month paid monthly, or annually $34.99 payment
While learning a new language, one of the best resources available is other people. Native speakers are one of the most reliable sources for authoritative answers to your language questions. They know intuitively and deeply how the language is supposed to be used.
…HiNative Review: Useful But Not Exceptional Q&A AppRead More »
- italki Review – The Good, The Bad, & The Just Alright
italki
Summary
italki is the most flexible and affordable place to find a tutor for the language you’re learning. They have a huge number of teachers offering classes to students of over 100 different languages. As a learner, you’ll be able to find a tutor that best fits your learning style, schedule, and personality. Teachers are able to set their own prices and make their own schedule.
You’ll find everyone from long-time professionals to brand new teachers.
The overall platform has tons of useful features but also some room for improvement.
Huge number of teachers, low prices, and flexible scheduling.
I Like
- There are large numbers of teachers available even for less common languages.
- You can find skilled teachers even at low prices.
- The flexibility to schedule lessons whenever convenient. The huge number of teachers guarantees you’ll find someone to fit your schedule.
- The extra features in the italki Community make it easy to ask questions, get your writing checked, and find a free language exchange partner.
I Don’t Like
- Community features are only available through the app.
- You may need to try several tutors before finding one that fits your learning and personality style.
- It’s easy to not take classes as often as you should.
Price
The prices vary by teacher and language with some being as low as $5 and others as high as $60 per hour. Most will fall somewhere near the $10 per hour range. Right now italki is offering a $10 credit with your first purchase.
It’s very rare for me to recommend a particular resource for everyone, regardless of the language that they’re studying. Usually each language will have their own unique resources that are great specifically for students of that language.
…italki Review – The Good, The Bad, & The Just AlrightRead More »
- Jiveworld (previously Lupa) Review – As Tested by 11 Spanish Learners
Jiveworld (Lupa)
Summary
Jiveworld (previously Lupa) is a podcast-style app that helps Latin American Spanish learners improve their listening comprehension. The company has partnered with NPR’s Radio Ambulante to republish fascinating stories and interviews full of cultural insights and natural Spanish. Then, they have added a bunch of learner-friendly features to help you understand what’s being said: variable speeds, partial transcripts and translations, definitions and more. The stories are what shine here. They represent diverse communities around Latin America, and the recordings are high quality. Most of our testers found their listening comprehension markedly improved after just a couple of weeks. However, Lupa could benefit from additional features, such as review activities, interactive quizzes and learner pathways. It’s also not suited to beginners, while lower-intermediate learners may struggle.
NOTE: LUPA IS NOW JIVEWORLD. WE UNDERSTAND THE APP HAS BEEN TOTALLY REDESIGNED AND IMPROVED, BUT HAVE NOT YET HAD OPPORTUNITY TO TEST IT OUT. This review applies to the old Lupa.
The quality is generally excellent, although the app is difficult to use with a screen reader.
Lupa’s stories are fascinating, if at times heavy-going, but there are no learning pathways and testers struggled to remember vocabulary.
Users found it to be an excellent use of their time but were divided over whether they would pay the subscription rate.
I Like
- They noticed an improvement in their listening comprehension after one or two weeks.
- Fascinating stories full of cultural insights.
- Plenty to challenge even advanced learners.
- Wide range of Latin American Spanish dialects and communities.
I Don’t Like
- The vocab feature is extremely basic.
- No interactive or review activities.
- The material can be challenging.
- Limited light-hearted stories.
Price
$12/month zero-commitment or $99/year charged in one lump sum
By signing up via the link below, the cost is $10/month or $84/year.NOTE: LUPA IS NOW JIVEWORLD. WE UNDERSTAND THE APP HAS BEEN TOTALLY REDESIGNED AND IMPROVED, BUT HAVE NOT YET HAD OPPORTUNITY TO TEST IT OUT. The review applies to the old Lupa.
Listening comprehension is one of the trickiest things to improve as a learner. And the better you get at speaking Spanish, the more likely it is that the person you’re talking with will start using local slang and natural phrasing, like
hacer locha (laze about) or revolú (mess).
…Jiveworld (previously Lupa) Review – As Tested by 11 Spanish LearnersRead More »
- Kwiziq Review: Learn Grammar From Lots Of Quizzes
Kwiziq
Summary
Kwiziq is a language-learning platform offering courses in Spanish and French with a curriculum centered around quiz-like exercises. There are plenty of grammar lessons that accompany these quizzes as well as some writing and listening practice opportunities. It isn’t the most fun resource to use, and it makes the most sense for learners that are especially interested in grammar.
The interface is pretty easy to use and the material is high-quality, but the content and exercises aren’t engaging.
Grammar explanations and quiz feedback are impressive, but the exercises are limited.
There are less expensive resources out there, but this platform could be right for some people.
I Like
- The test feedback is detailed and useful
- The writing practice is effective
I Don’t Like
- The practice opportunities aren’t varied
- Grammar lessons offer explanations but little practice
- The reading practice is limited
Price
The basic account is free, and a premium package is available for the following monthly subscription options:
$22.79/month $56.97/three months $122.29/year $227.76/two years
Are you a good test-taker? Tests stress some people out; others love to see how well they can perform. This resource certainly appeals to the latter.
…Kwiziq Review: Learn Grammar From Lots Of QuizzesRead More »
- Language Transfer Review – Better Than A Lot Of Expensive Courses
Language Transfer
Summary
The Language Transfer’s courses approach language learning with what has been coined as “The Thinking Method’. These audio courses serve as a great introduction to the nine languages currently available. They go into lots of depth on how each language works, teaching you all of the main grammar points and giving you the tools needed to learn independently and intuitively. For beginners looking to learn a language, these free courses are an effective and efficient way to start your journey.
Might look a bit basic but the content is very well designed.
The courses don’t follow the traditional learning path but have a lot of depth.
It’s completely free and better than most paid resources.
I Like
- Lessons are efficient in that they cover a lot of material in a short amount of time.
- The lessons teach you a mix of grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation each time and so you really come away understanding how the language is formed.
- Mihalis (the founder) presents everything in a very calm and relaxed manner, thoroughly explaining everything as he goes while encouraging the student who answers his questions.
- For each language, the course is created independently and follows its own learning path.
I Don’t Like
- While the content is very good quality, it could maybe do with varying the presentation a bit as there are no exercises, quizzes or work for you to produce.
- The lessons kind of progress in a strange manner as you don’t follow a traditional language learning route, such as starting off with greetings, etc.
- You won’t hear any native speakers on most of the courses and you don’t ever actually hear a conversation.
Price
Completely free, but if you find the courses to be useful, consider making a donation.
Language Transfer Review – Better Than A Lot Of Expensive CoursesRead More »
- Language101.com Course Review – The Worst I’ve Ever Tried!
Language101.com Course
Summary
Language101 (not to be confused with LanguagePod101) is the worst course I’ve ever tried. The platform has ten different languages for you to choose from and focuses on teaching speaking and comprehension. Consequently, you likely won’t learn how to spell, write or translate the language, or even learn any of the grammar. I found the courses to be poorly designed — each ‘lesson’ is identical in form, and the fast-paced learning method seems inefficient; it is doubtful whether even beginners will learn much. To make matters worse, the price is obscenely expensive.
Easy enough to use, but I thought the content was severely lacking.
There are virtually no explanations at all. You just learn to parrot and memorize words and phrases.
Terrible value in my opinion. It honestly feels like a scam. Not worth using even if it were free.
I Like
- They provide you with a literal translation of the phrase you are asked to produce.
- Despite coming away thinking this is a terrible product (and it is), I liked being asked to produce words and phrases.
I Don’t Like
- I don’t agree with their ‘teaching’ method which basically asks you to produce words and phrases in a language you have never learned before as quickly as possible.
- The ‘courses’ are a muddled mess, I didn’t see any logical progression, and there is only one exercise for you to do ad infinitum until you lose your mind.
- It is insanely expensive. My god. It is insulting how much money they are charging for a product this terrible.
Price
Language101 has lots of different subscription plans for you to choose from. A one-time payment for access to all of its languages costs $727 or $97/month if you opt for the monthly installments option (that would end up working out at $1,164 if you chose the latter!!).
For ‘1 Package’ of the language of your choice it is then $227 for lifetime access or $527 if you want all 3 packages in a given language.Alternatives: Literally anything else on the Internet (or in a bookstore) would be better!
…Language101.com Course Review – The Worst I’ve Ever Tried!Read More »
- LanguagePod101 — All Languages, Pod101 and Class101
Updated November 20, 2023
If you want a language learning podcast that consistently adds new content to keep you motivated, you will find the “Pod101” and “Class101” series quite useful.
One great thing about LanguagePod101 programs is that they do publish new content ALL THE TIME. And their pricing structure allows language learners of any mastery and commitment levels to find contents that are useful. The pricing starts at a mere few dollars per month, and the top subscription called Premium PLUS gives learners personal feedback and a personalized program to follow.
Visit Language Learning Programs in the LanguagePod101 Series
Click the icon to visit the site for the language you want. Purchase or just check it out. Happy Learning!
You can also read ALR independent reviews for each language’s program in the following section.
…LanguagePod101 — All Languages, Pod101 and Class101Read More »
- Lengalia Review: Solid But Not Spectacular Spanish Lessons
Lengalia
Summary
Lengalia is an online resource for learning Spanish. It offers extensive material at all levels and across a wide variety of focuses. There are courses for those learning Spanish for business, for travel, and general Spanish. Lengalia also offers official CEFR certifications for students that complete a course.
There were some mistakes in the material and the interface isn’t very fun to use, but the audio quality and advanced material are good.
While there isn’t much in the way of speaking and writing practice, the lessons are very thorough and well-structured.
The price may be worth it for those interested in obtaining a CEFR certificate, but there are more efficient ways to learn.
I Like
- It has good material for advanced learners.
- The translation tool is very helpful.
- Lessons are structured well.
I Don’t Like
- The practice opportunities can get repetitive.
- There are some mistakes in the material.
- There isn’t much of a communicative aspect.
- The tutor feature is misleading.
Price
A subscription to one course, without videos or podcasts, is $34.99/month. A subscription to all 24 courses, with access to videos and podcasts, is $133.98/year.
Resources that are focused on teaching one language generally do a better job at it than those that set out to teach a bunch of different languages. For this reason, I was excited to try out Lengalia, a Spanish-only resource.
…Lengalia Review: Solid But Not Spectacular Spanish LessonsRead More »
- Ling Review — Gamified Practice in Less Common Languages
Ling
Summary
Ling is a gamified language-learning app with courses on over 60 different languages. Practice happens through short themed lessons, making for convenient and entertaining study time. It isn’t the most comprehensive resource out there, especially for more popular languages, but it can make a decent way to get started with a less common language.
The app is easy to use and visually appealing, but I found some mistakes in the material.
There aren’t many explanations, and the materials are the same for each language, but practice is varied.
For many of its less common languages, there aren’t a lot of viable alternatives, but the price feels high.
I Like
- It uses native speaker audio.
- The activities are enjoyable and don’t become overly repetitive.
- It’s easy to use and is visually appealing.
I Don’t Like
- There are very few grammar explanations.
- There are no translations for individual words.
- Some activities can be buggy.
Price
Monthly is $8.99, Annual is $79.99, Lifetime is $149.99
Gamified learning is here to stay. The large pool of language-learning apps that leverage gamification in their courses is continually growing, and frankly, I’m happy about it.
…Ling Review — Gamified Practice in Less Common LanguagesRead More »
- Lingoda Review – Positive Experience But Room For Improvement
Lingoda
Summary
Lingoda is an online language learning platform where you can take private or group classes at any time of the day. They offer lessons in Spanish, German, French, and English. There are a large number of lessons available for everyone from absolute beginners to more advanced levels. It’s a good option to get the structure of a course with the guidance of a teacher, at an affordable price.
Both the platform and the content itself are easy to use and presented well.
Although there are hundreds of lessons, they could use a bit more variety and you’ll need to study them with a teacher to get much benefit.
It’s an affordable option that gives you access to good teachers and a comprehensive course.
I Like
- The flexible hours mean that you can pretty much take a class whenever suits you – whether that’s 3am or 3pm!
- Right from the start, the teachers speak almost entirely in the language that you’re learning.
- There are hundreds of different classes covering different subjects for all levels.
I Don’t Like
- The quality of your class and how much content you cover relies to a large extent on the other students. This also impacts how much time you actually get to speak.
- The lesson materials all look quite similar and there is not much variation between lessons.
Price
There are lots of different plans available whether it matters how many classes you want to take or if you want to do individual or group.
For group classes, it is $399.99 a month, which gives you access to 40 class subscriptions.
For private classes, the plan is $799.99 a month for 40 classes.
There are a lot of smaller plans than these so take a look as to what is interesting to you.
There are also “marathon” plans for three, six, or twelve months that offer lower per-class rates and a chance to earn cashback if you attend 90% of your classes.It’s an affordable option that gives you access to good teachers and a comprehensive course.Lingoda is an online language learning school where classes take place 24/7 and native speakers teach you either English, French, German or Spanish (depending on what you sign up for). The lessons progress in difficulty following a course and the teachers help you out along the way in both private and group lessons where you’ll be with up to four other people.
…Lingoda Review – Positive Experience But Room For ImprovementRead More »
- Lingodeer Review – A Better Alternative To Duolingo, Busuu, Rosetta Stone, etc.
Last Updated on December 12, 2023.
Lingodeer
Summary
Lingodeer may not be as well known as other language learning apps, but it’s actually better and cheaper than most of them. You’ll practice the language by completing lots of different types of exercises. They also include plenty of grammar explanations and opportunities to review what you’ve studied. All in all, it’s one of the better options for getting started learning a language.
It has a great design and everything works well with only a few minor issues.
Not as thorough as some other courses but it’s good for what it is.
Quite a bit of content is free and the premium plan is very affordable.
I Like
- Lots of different exercise types in the lessons.
- Detailed grammar explanations.
- Clear audio recordings.
- Inexpensive!
I Don’t Like
- The content isn’t always ordered well with some unusual words thrown in too early.
- Not sufficient for developing oral communication skills.
Price
$14.99/mo, $39.99 for 3 months, $150.99 for a year. There’s also a lifetime option for $299.99. You may also occasionally find sales, such as the yearly rate dropping by 50% to $79.99.
Lingodeer Review – A Better Alternative To Duolingo, Busuu, Rosetta Stone, etc.Read More »
- LingQ Review – Extensive Reading Made Easy
LingQ
Summary
LingQ is a language-learning platform that focuses on extensive reading for over 30 different languages. You can import your own content or choose from the community library of books, articles, podcasts, YouTube videos, and more.
The app highlights unknown words across every lesson and makes them reviewable via different types of SRS flashcards. The more you read, the more accurately you will be able to identify content that is suitable for your level.
Although I did not find it beneficial for languages I had never studied before, I think LingQ can be helpful for upper-beginner to advanced language learners who enjoy reading. It is especially helpful if you struggle to find graded readers in your target language.
The LingQ reading app is enjoyable in most languages, easy to use, and can expand your vocabulary. However, I found the user content frustrating to navigate.
With the import function, users can choose to study almost anything they want.
Now that other apps provide similar functions, the monthly subscription may be a bit overpriced. However, the yearly subscription seems fair.
I Like
- I can easily import almost any material I want to study.
- I can use SRS flashcards to quiz new words from a specific page.
- Each lesson in the library displays the percentage of known and unknown words based on my reading history.
- There are many dictionaries to choose from for definitions.
I Don’t Like
- Reviewing words is chaotic. Every word you look up gets added to a huge queue that quickly becomes unmanageable.
- The extra features are overpriced and can be found other places for cheaper.
- Very little of the content is original. Much of it was uploaded by users from other places.
- The free version is extremely limited.
Price
Premium membership costs $12.99/mo, $71.94/half-year, $107.88/year, $191.76/2-years; single-language lifetime membership costs $199
When I first signed up for LingQ, I wasn’t very impressed. Its seemingly random lesson library, filled with custom cover photos and inconsistent title formats, made me want to click on just about anything to get away from that page.
… - Lingualia Review — Best as a Casual Study Supplement
Lingualia
Summary
Lingualia is an online language-learning app targeted toward learners of English and Spanish. It utilizes artificial intelligence and its “exclusive Adaptive Learning method” to offer a learning experience that’s somewhat personalized. Practice happens through interactive activities that cover a variety of skills and have an element of gamification. The free version of Lingualia could make a good option for intermediate or advanced learners that want a casual, convenient way to keep their English or Iberian Spanish skills sharp. It probably isn’t the best option for beginners, those looking for a one-stop-shop resource, or students of Latin American Spanish.
It’s designed well and fun to use, but machine translations aren’t always accurate and the adaptive learning method could be better.
Practice is varied and the courses cover a lot of material, but it’s doubtful you’d actually reach a B2 level.
Great features and amount of content available for free, but I think the subscription prices are too high.
I Like
- Male and female native speaker audio.
- It’s fun to use.
- Potential for human feedback on writing.
I Don’t Like
- There are no speaking exercises.
- Review opportunities are limited.
- The community doesn’t seem very active.
Price
A limited version of the resource is available for free. Access to all features is available for a recurring subscription:
1 month: $25
3 months: $45 ($15/month)
6 months: $59.70 ($9.95/month)Adaptive learning! Artificial intelligence! Personalized learning experience!
…Lingualia Review — Best as a Casual Study SupplementRead More »
- Lingvist Review: Putting Their Courses To The Test
Lingvist
Summary
Lingvist is a language learning resource that uses spaced repetition and flashcards to help you build your vocabulary in a new language. There are five language courses made for English speakers, and some of these have an extra challenges section with additional reading, speaking, grammar, and listening practice. Lingvist is straightforward, easy to use, and most effective for beginners or intermediate learners.
The interface is easy to use and practice is enjoyable, but the grammar explanations aren’t great.
The vocabulary practice is great, but the additional features are somewhat limited and vary by language.
A subscription isn’t super expensive, but it isn’t the best resource for a comprehensive education.
I Like
- It’s easy to use
- Learning new words is fun
- It’s effective at teaching new vocabulary
I Don’t Like
- The grammar explanations aren’t very helpful
- Practice can get monotonous
- Limited speaking and writing opportunities
Price
Pricing options include $9.99 a month or $79.99 per year.
Most language learning tools either aim to do something different or to do something that’s been done before exceptionally well. Learning new words with flashcards isn’t a novel idea, but it can be pretty effective.
…Lingvist Review: Putting Their Courses To The TestRead More »
- Live Lingua Review: My Experience With Their Lessons
Live Lingua
Summary
Live Lingua is an online language school that pairs students with certified teachers for one-on-one online classes. The platform aims to provide a more personalized service than online tutor directories by assigning a personal class coordinator and a customized curriculum for each student. Lessons are available in seven different popular languages and for a variety of different courses.
All teachers are native speakers and receive additional training through Live Lingua.
Lots of extra free material, but with mistakes. There are specialized course options, and video lessons happen on Skype.
More expensive than other online classes and less flexible, but more personalized.
I Like
- The huge library of free resources
- The different course options
I Don’t Like
- The layout of the site is strange and doesn’t feel very professional
- Relying on email to schedule lessons isn’t efficient
- Limited flexibility in choosing a teacher
Price
The hourly rate for classes on Live Lingua ranges from $24 – $29 depending on the certificate, language, and number of classes you purchase. The first lesson is free.
In the words of its founders, Live Lingua is a “boutique” online language school.
…Live Lingua Review: My Experience With Their LessonsRead More »
- Living Language Online Course Review – Not Very Good
Living Language Online Course
Summary
UPDATE – it appears that the online course Living Language no longer exists. This review covers the old course when it did exist. You can however find a series of books with this name available on amazon.
Though the information itself is useful, Living Language’s presentation reads more like a database than an educational/interactive tool.
Again, a lot of the information is there, but it’s scattered. Additionally, some of that information appears incorrect.
Cheaper options offer the same amount of content with more interactive features.
I Like
- You can hop around between levels and topics, including Beginner and Advanced materials.
- The subscription comes with a grammar guide, glossary, and forum access.
- There’s a decent variety of games, including some games I hadn’t played before.
I Don’t Like
- Although the games are fun, they get stale pretty quickly. It’s easy to guess at answers, thereby completing levels without really having learned.
- The system doesn’t keep track of your mistakes, so it’s hard to know what areas you need to improve in.
- I found several translation and presentation errors that made me question the rest of the material.
Price
An annual plan costs $150, and half a year costs $75. Three months is $50 and 1 month is $39.
An Overview of Living Language
Living Language offers you the opportunity to choose between over 20 languages. Once you pick your language, you’re taken to the home screen which has options for Essential, Intermediate, and Advanced categories. You can start with any of these options and jump back and forth between them.
…Living Language Online Course Review – Not Very GoodRead More »
- Mango Languages Review – Pretty Good For Beginners
Mango Languages
Summary
Mango Languages is a pretty good resource with numerous languages available along with their regional variations. It’ll work the best for beginners or for those interested in studying a few languages at the same time. Anybody past the intermediate level won’t find Mango Languages very useful.
It is well designed, has a beautiful interface, and is intuitive to use.
There are some gaps in terms of writing and grammar, along with a lack of materials for intermediate or higher level students.
The price is fair and will give you access to materials for over 70 languages.
I Like
- It’s very easy to use and has a slick design.
- The intense drilling of useful real life sentences and words during lessons will really help you remember them.
- Cultural and grammar notes incorporated in the lessons are well-prepared to help you understand the language you’re learning better.
- The subscription gives you access to over 70 languages.
I Don’t Like
- Most courses finish around the intermediate level with some less popular languages ending before that.
- There’s not enough grammar practice.
- During drilling, when a student is prompted to complete a task such as coming up with an appropriate translation of a sentence, the command is read out loud. Listening to someone repeat very similar commands over and over again is tedious.
- The Google Translate plugin is a rather lazy and disappointing way to give students answers about words or sentences they’d like to translate.
Price
A subscription to Mango Languages costs $14.99 a month or 179.99 yearly.
Mango Languages has high-quality beginner to intermediate level lessons in tons of different languages.
…Mango Languages Review – Pretty Good For BeginnersRead More »
- Memrise Review – Useful But Don’t Overuse It
Memrise
Summary
Memrise is a super popular language-learning app available online and on mobile. It functions much like a gamified flashcard app, and it offers a lot of content for free. A lot of the content is user-created, and there is a premium subscription that provides access to additional features. Memrise can be a great tool in your arsenal, but you’ll need more to learn a language seriously.
The mobile app looks great and is easy to use, but the website is clunky. Works very well for memorization.
There are quite a few official Memrise courses, and the number of user-created courses is massive, but you’ll benefit from using additional resources.
The free version of the app provides a lot of value, but the paid version doesn’t offer much more.
I Like
- The spaced repetition software is effective for memorization
- The huge range of available content
- It’s more interactive than other flashcard apps
I Don’t Like
- It’s not enough for continued language learning
- Website navigation is clunky
- Premium version isn’t much more valuable than the free version
Price
For the full version of Memrise, the subscription prices are:
$8.99/monthly $59.99/annually $119.99 – lifetime subscription
Signing up for a free account with Memrise automatically gives you access to limited versions of their official courses.
What do you get when a Grand Master of Memory and a Princeton neuroscientist team up to create a language learning app?
… - Michel Thomas Method Review – Avoid At All Costs
Michel Thomas Method
Summary
One of the most famous language teaching courses out there, Michel Thomas is a household name. The platform advertises itself as “The method that works with your brain” and boasts a teaching method “with no books, exercises, memorizing or homework” in several of its course descriptions. It’s available in 18 languages with courses that have material suitable for absolute beginners. I tried out the French foundation course and found it to be severely lacking and as such cannot recommend it at all. You may, however, have more luck with the other language courses that they offer.
Very easy to use, and the audios are decent quality, but I found that Michel Thomas’ discouraging manner flustered students, which detracted from the content’s quality in my experience.
In my opinion, Michel Thomas doesn’t go into much depth and any explanations he offers up are just at a surface level.
I wouldn’t use these even if they were free due to Michel Thomas’ teaching style which ruined the material for me.
I Like
- Um…in all honesty I’m not sure if I enjoyed any of it!
I Don’t Like
- Michel Thomas never praises the students, often interrupts them and creates a negative learning environment.
- The pacing of the lessons often seems off to me and in certain places they feel very hurried.
- I thought all of the lessons were almost identical and so it got quite monotonous working through them.
Price
There are several different courses available with prices ranging from $11.99 to $100.
Before working my way through the French foundation course, I had never tried a Michel Thomas course despite hearing so much about it.
… - Mimic Method Review: Trying Out The Elemental Sounds Courses
Mimic Method
Summary
Created by Idahosa, the Mimic Method’s ‘Elemental Sounds Masters Classes’ are not your traditional type of language learning course as you won’t learn any grammar or vocabulary. The focus is instead on learning the elemental sounds of the language. This is because once you can conceptualise them, then you can train your ear to hear and understand them and afterwards train your mouth to produce and pronounce these sounds. Useful for both beginners and advanced learners, you would obviously need to use it in conjunction with a couple of other resources to progress in your target language.
Easy to use and navigate, the production quality is fine without being amazing.
Quite technical throughout most of the course, Idahosa thoroughly explains the method and sounds in each language.
Very expensive for what it is, I think it is as interesting take at learning pronunciation but you won’t get anything else from it.
I Like
- Some of the homework exercises are really interesting and quite unlike anything you’ll find on other language courses.
- Idahosa goes into quite a lot of depth on how to pronounce the different elemental sounds of each language. At the end of the course you will know all the different sounds from the language that you are learning.
- It was a fresh way of learning a language that I had never contemplated before
I Don’t Like
- I found the course to be very technical and while other people will surely find it interesting, it didn’t resonate so much with me unfortunately as it just wasn’t that fun to follow.
- You would certainly have to use the course alongside other learning resources which actually teach you the grammar, vocabulary, reading, writing, speaking and cultural context of your target language.
- You do not get much material for the high price that it costs.
Price
For lifetime access to a course, the Mimic Method website has slashed its cost from $394 to $197 although I am uncertain if it always stays that price.
Mimic Method Review: Trying Out The Elemental Sounds CoursesRead More »
- Mondly Review – Made Significant Improvements Made in 2022
Mondly
Summary
Mondly is a language-learning app that teaches basic vocabulary and grammar structures. It seems most appropriate for learners with little to no exposure to their target language.
The activities mostly rely on passive recognition of vocabulary and phrases, and therefore are not very challenging. However, they are varied enough that you probably wouldn’t get bored with short, daily practice sessions.
Although I wouldn’t recommend Mondly to anyone looking to seriously learn a language, it may be appropriate for individuals studying languages with less available resources, or for individuals who are preparing to travel abroad.
Both the interface and the course itself could be designed better. *Edited on Nov 22* It has made many improvements this year. We will update soon.
It’s decent for learning vocabulary, but I thought a lot of the material wasn’t explained very well.
It’s fairly inexpensive.
I Like
- Daily lessons, weekly quizzes, and monthly challenges – these functionalities encourage you to practice every day.
- The vocabulary included is useful and drilled in an effective way.
- It’s fairly inexpensive.
I Don’t Like
- The content and exercises are the same for all levels and languages.
- The exercises are mostly passive.
- I don’t think the order of lessons and topics is very well thought out.
- For me, the interface is not user friendly and the platform is visually unappealing.
Price
There are three plans… $9.99 per month for one language $47.99 per year ($4/mo) for one language and $99.99 for lifetime.
Mondly Review – Made Significant Improvements Made in 2022Read More »
- News In Slow Spanish Review – Definitely One Of My Favorites
News In Slow Spanish
Summary
News in Slow Spanish is easily one of my favorite language learning resources I’ve come across. They offer so much more than just current events narrated at a slower pace. It’s a comprehensive, engaging, fun, and effective way to study Spanish. It offers material in three different levels, for beginner, intermediate, and advanced learners, along with lessons using Spanish from either Spain or Latin America.
I’m super impressed with the quality of their lessons.
Teaches grammar and expressions in a unique way that’s very thorough.
The amount of value offered makes the price quite reasonable.
I Like
- Pretty much everything – seriously.
- The beginner course gets students listening to, reading, and understanding Spanish much faster than most other courses would.
- The grammar and expressions lessons are fantastic, and there’s a huge catalog of these available.
- The news stories are, of course, interesting.
I Don’t Like
- The advanced level is useful but not as impressive as the rest of their content.
- Their app is very basic so you may prefer using the mobile version on your phone.
Price
7-day free trial, then $22.90/month. You also have the option to prepay for any amount of months at a time, which doesn’t change the monthly price.
News in Slow Spanish is an online resource offering a wide range of material for Spanish language learners. It covers material in beginner, intermediate, and advanced levels, and it is much, much more than just a slo-mo Spanish-language news source.
…News In Slow Spanish Review – Definitely One Of My FavoritesRead More »
- Ouino Review – My Experience Testing Their Spanish Course
Ouino
Summary
Ouino is a software program and mobile app with more than 500 lessons and 1,000 exercises in Spanish, French, Italian, German, and Portuguese. It’s curriculum-based with an academic approach (as opposed to relying on gameplay like some other language apps). It covers the basics such as vocab and pronunciation, but can also help you improve your conversation skills and master verb tenses.
Ouino would be great for you if you want to pick a language back up after not using it for a while, if you love structure, or if you want lots of practice. It could also be a good resource for language students who want to keep their skills sharp in between semesters.
The usability and content quality are great, but the layout and structure of the exercises take a minute to get used to.
The lessons explain the topics in depth and give several examples.
A lot of solid content and useful exercises are included for a relatively low cost.
I Like
- Ouino accommodates both auditory and visual learning styles. Each lesson is read aloud as well as shown on screen. Exercises incorporate sound and pictures. Important words are color coded, read aloud quickly, and then repeated slowly.
- You can access all the lessons at any time. You don’t have to work through a topic you already know if you don’t want to.
- It’s very affordable, especially if you’re willing to commit to a six-month plan. A subscription gives you access to all courses.
I Don’t Like
- The pronunciation section doesn’t grade you. You have to compare your recording with a native speaker and decide for yourself if you’re close enough.
- The structure of the exercises is the same for every lesson in the section. It can get repetitive and boring.
Price
The 3-month plan is a one-time payment of $38.58.
The 6-month plan a one-time payment of $59.94.
The 12-month plan is a one-time payment of $83.88.
The Lifetime plan is a one-time payment of $95.76Limited time offer. Lifetime Access is only $95.76!! You can get an additional language for 50% off, OR you could get all 5 languages for life for $191.52. You should know that Ouino enjoys one of the lowest product return rates in the industry. 🙂
I had never used Ouino before this review and wasn’t sure what to expect as there’s not a ton of impartial information about the program online. So, I decided to try it out.
…Ouino Review – My Experience Testing Their Spanish CourseRead More »
- Pimsleur Review — Learn While You… Do Just About Anything
Pimsleur
Summary
Pimsleur is one of the most popular and longest-standing resources out there for learning a foreign language. Its courses place a strong emphasis on aural and verbal communication skills, paying less attention to grammar explanations and reading or writing skills. There are over 50 language courses available with Pimsleur, and the bulk of the material is taught with audio lessons.
The platform is extremely well designed and easy to use. The content seems to be of high quality at all levels.
Timely repetition and active practice work well, and lessons build on each other nicely, but the “intermediate fluency in 30 days” claim may be a stretch.
The subscription option provides good value for some, but there may be more efficient ways to learn some languages.
I Like
- The lessons are structured well and are an appropriate length.
- There are both male and female native speakers.
- Lessons build on each other nicely.
- The platform is easy to navigate and visually appealing.
I Don’t Like
- There’s very little visual content.
- Lesson speed isn’t customizable.
Price
Subscriptions of either $14.95/month or $19.95/month are available for courses with at least 60 lessons. Prices otherwise range from around $20 to over $500. All purchases come with a 7-day free trial.
What is Pimsleur?
Frankly, it’s an institution. The name comes from linguist Paul Pimsleur, author of many books on language acquisition and applied linguistics, and developer of what is now known as the Pimsleur Method.
…Pimsleur Review — Learn While You… Do Just About AnythingRead More »
- Pimsleur Spanish Review – Super Fast Way To Speaking Spanish
Pimsleur Spanish
Summary
Pimsleur is one of the most popular and longest-standing resources out there for learning a foreign language. Its courses place a strong emphasis on aural and verbal communication skills, paying less attention to grammar explanations and reading or writing skills. The bulk of the material for Pimsleur Spanish is taught with audio lessons.
The platform is extremely well designed and easy to use. The content seems to be of high quality at all levels.
Timely repetition and active practice work well, and lessons build on each other nicely, but the “intermediate fluency in 30 days” claim may be a stretch.
The subscription option is a good value, or you may be better off purchasing the program if you want to go at a slower pace.
I Like
- The lessons are structured well and are an appropriate length.
- There are both male and female native speakers.
- Lessons build on each other nicely.
- The platform is easy to navigate and visually appealing.
I Don’t Like
- There’s very little visual content.
- Lesson speed isn’t customizable.
Price
Subscriptions of either $14.95/month or $19.95/month are available for courses with at least 60 lessons. Prices otherwise range from around $20 to over $500. All purchases come with a 7-day free trial.
Did you know that over 40 million people speak Spanish in the United States, while more than 550 million speak Spanish worldwide? This makes Spanish an incredibly useful language! If you want to learn Spanish, you may find yourself considering a venerable language-learning program like Pimsleur’s Spanish app.
…Pimsleur Spanish Review – Super Fast Way To Speaking SpanishRead More »
- Preply Review – Tutors Created Tailored Lesson Plans for You
Preply
Summary
Preply is an online educational platform that matches tutors with students. There are tutors on Preply offering instruction in a wide range of languages and other subjects. As a learner, you can find a tutor that works best for you by browsing their demo videos and filtering by price and rating. Each tutor’s teaching style is their own, but they all receive teacher trainings and resources to improve their style.
A little bit of everything. There are trained professionals with years of experience and tutors trying it out for the first time.
The platform is easy to use, and tutors who specialize in subjects beyond languages, such as math and music are available. Lots of supplementary resources help reinforcement of lessons.
There’s a huge range of prices and scheduling options, and tutors offer tailored lesson plans adapted to each student’s objectives and preferences.
I Like
- The number of available tutors is massive
- Searching for a tutor is easy
- Many tutors are very inexpensive
- Finding a tutor with a schedule that works is easy
I Don’t Like
- You have to purchase a package of hours ahead of time
- Teachers aren’t paid for trial lessons
Price
Each tutor sets their own price, but for most popular languages the average hourly price is around $15.
Exclusive 50% discount for ALR readers! Make sure to use our link to receive it.
With nearly every language-learning resource I’ve used, I run into the same problem. I don’t feel like I’m getting adequate speaking practice. I know from experience that learning a language academically and using it in the wild are two very different beasts.
…Preply Review – Tutors Created Tailored Lesson Plans for YouRead More »
- Rocket Spanish Review – Boring But Still A Decent Course
Last Updated on December 13, 2023.
Rocket Spanish
Summary
Rocket Spanish is a pretty good Spanish course, but it’s not my personal favorite. Although I find the lessons tend to be very boring, the content is well structured and fairly comprehensive. There is a good mixture of listening, speaking, grammar, and review activities.
The app and the lessons are well designed, but I experienced some minor annoyances.
There are lots of practice activities following each lesson, and course structure seems logical.
Not cheap but not absurdly expensive either.
I Like
- Lessons are well structured and use increasingly more Spanish as you move up.
- The streamlined interface makes it easy to navigate lessons and activities.
- You’ll certainly learn a lot if you complete the exercises and review activities.
- Speaking practice is emphasized in the audio lessons and in numerous exercises.
I Don’t Like
- I found the audio lessons to be painfully boring.
- I thought the cultural lessons were poorly done and felt lazy.
- Although the reinforcement exercises are helpful, you’ll likely get sick of them.
Price
Level 1 costs $150.99. Levels 1 & 2 cost $300. Levels 1, 2 & 3 cost $450 (though you can often find discounts).
Rocket Spanish Review – Boring But Still A Decent CourseRead More »
- Rosetta Stone Review — Updated and Improved…And Needs More Improvement
Rosetta Stone
Summary
Rosetta Stone is one of the most well-known resources for learning languages. It takes an immersive approach to teaching and is widely used by corporations and individuals alike. High levels of repetition and an absence of translations or explanations are hallmarks of the course. Rosetta Stone course could be most suitable for learners that don’t mind repetitive exercises and prefer to learn from pictures and context rather than translations and explanations. It’s probably not a good option for anyone wanting to significantly improve their speaking or writing skills, or those looking for an engaging course.
The platform is a bit clunky on desktop, but the material is accurate and presented clearly; lesson mechanics are fairly intuitive.
Without much opportunity to build your own sentences, I don’t think you’ll reach a conversational level with any notable speed.
Rosetta Stone’s Lifetime Subscription ($199 on sale) is quite attractive if you like the Rosetta Stone Method. Shorter subscriptions are quite reasonable, too.
I Like
- The audio quality is very good.
- Lessons progress naturally and logically.
I Don’t Like
- It’s repetitive and boring.
- You don’t get to generate your own sentences.
- Speech recognition doesn’t work very well.
- No grammar explanations in core material.
Price
A three-month subscription to one language is $35.97, which works out to be $11.99/month.
A year-long subscription to one course is $95.88, which is $7.99/month. Both of these subscriptions are automatically recurring.
Lifetime access to all Rosetta Stone language courses is available for $199.ALR Readers Exclusive Holiday Deal!! Get the Lifetime Subscription for 25 languages for $179 (everywhere else it’s $199 right now!). See details on the website.
Chances are, this isn’t the first time you’re hearing about Rosetta Stone for learning languages. The company has been hugely successful since its early start in the computer-assisted learning scene in 1992, and part of that is thanks to stellar advertising efforts.
…Rosetta Stone Review — Updated and Improved…And Needs More ImprovementRead More »
- Rosetta Stone Spanish Review – It Works For Some, But…Make Sure To Check Out The Alternatives
Rosetta Stone Spanish
Summary
Rosetta Stone is one of the most well-known resources for learning languages. It takes an immersive approach to teaching and there is no English explanation. High levels of repetition and an absence of translations or explanations are hallmarks of the Rosetta Stone Spanish program.
The platform is a bit clunky on desktop, but the material is accurate and presented clearly; lesson mechanics are fairly intuitive.
Without much opportunity to build your own sentences, I don’t think you’ll reach a conversational level with any notable speed.
Lifetime access can be a great value if you like Rosetta Stone’s method and want to try out many different languages.
I Like
- Excellent speaking software
- Fun way to learn vocabulary
- Themed units on practical topics
I Don’t Like
- Immersive approach means no grammar explanations in English
- Formal and slow dialogue
Price
A three-month subscription to one language is $35.97, which works out to be $11.99/month.
A year-long subscription to one course is $95.88, which is $7.99/month. Both of these subscriptions are automatically recurring.
Lifetime access to all Rosetta Stone language courses is available for $199.ALR Readers Exclusive Holiday Deal!! Get the Lifetime Subscription for 25 languages for $179 (everywhere else it’s $199 right now!). See details on the website.
Even if you’re a total newbie at learning languages, you’ve probably heard of Rosetta Stone’s promise to impart a second language by using your brain’s innate abilities. Rosetta Stone Spanish offers 80 hours of lessons and activities in immersive Spanish. In each lesson, you match words, sounds, and images together just like a child does when learning to speak.
… - Rype App Review: I Wouldn’t Recommend It To Anybody
Rype App
Summary
Rype is a resource that provides language learners with access to one-on-one lessons with teachers. According to its advertising, you’ll be able to “Learn anytime, anywhere, on-the-go.” Users purchase a subscription package that contains a certain number of lessons per month. The lessons are 30-minutes long and are easy to schedule.
The platform is very easy to use, but there aren’t many teacher details and lessons take place on Skype.
There seems to be a range of experience levels on Rype and a very small number of teachers.
The hourly rates are higher than similar online tutor options and you have to commit to a subscription.
I Like
- The interface is very easy to use.
- The 30-minute lesson length.
- A subscription grants access to lessons in all languages offered.
I Don’t Like
- There isn’t a lot of information provided on teachers.
- I don’t think the monthly subscription model is worth it.
- The selection of teachers for some languages is extremely limited.
Price
The price varies per subscription package and number of lessons each month. This ranges from $59.99-179.99.
The availability of online one-on-one language courses has skyrocketed in recent years, and it’s made it possible for just about anyone with an internet connection to find a suitable language tutor.
…Rype App Review: I Wouldn’t Recommend It To AnybodyRead More »
- Spanish With Paul Course Review – Solid Content But Not Very Exciting
Spanish With Paul Course
Summary
Spanish with Paul is a video course that has over eighty hours of content to work through. The in-depth explanations will certainly give you a great foundation and understanding of Spanish grammar, vocabulary and sentence structures. While the course is not that fun and you don’t get any speaking practice, I’d say it is definitely an effective way of learning the language if you are a serious and dedicated learner who doesn’t get bored easily.
The videos look a bit basic and aren’t all that fun to watch but the audio is perfect and the concepts are clearly explained.
Very in-depth explanations on everything from grammar and vocabulary to sentence structure and pronunciation.
Not the cheapest or most exciting option but there’s a lot of good content.
I Like
- Paul gets you to think and engage with how Spanish is spoken so you understand how to use the language.
- He goes into great depth on all of the grammar points that come up as well as the texts or stories which he asks you to translate.
- The course gradually progresses in difficulty and towards the end gets pretty advanced.
I Don’t Like
- It isn’t all that fun to work through and every single video is almost identical to the one before it.
- You are not asked to produce much Spanish other than by saying words or phrases out loud to yourself.
- There are no native speakers featured in the course and lots of English is used throughout – even at the highest levels.
Price
For one year access, the ‘Course Only’ is $99.95 and ‘Course + Weekly Updates’ costs $199.95.
We’ve had a few readers ask about our opinion of the Spanish with Paul course. So, naturally, and several months later, I’ve finally gotten the chance to try out his course.
…Spanish With Paul Course Review – Solid Content But Not Very ExcitingRead More »
- SpanishPod101 Review – Good Content with Some Pointless Extras
SpanishPod101
Summary
SpanishPod101 primarily offers audio lessons for beginner level Spanish students. Unfortunately, the number of lessons available at the intermediate and higher levels drops off quite a bit. There are a lot of extra features, some of which are pretty cool, but many of which aren’t that useful. Overall, I think SpanishPod101 is pretty good but not sufficient by itself.
Everything works well and the lessons are high-quality
Great for beginners but intermediate and higher levels won’t get much out of it.
They’re sneaky about hiding the real prices but it’s still a low cost and extensive option.
I Like
- An absurd amount of content for lower level students.
- Uses Spanish from lots of different countries and includes interesting cultural insights.
- As you move up levels, English is used less and less.
- Grammar is taught very well.
I Don’t Like
- The lack of content for those past the beginner level.
- Lower level lessons include lots of English banter between the hosts.
- Some of the extra features are pointless, while others like the quizzes, aren’t very well done.
- Constant hard selling and email spamming.
Price
There are three subscription plans with lengths between 1 month and 2 years. If you subscribe longer, the monthly cost lowers.
Basic Plan – $4/mo Premium Plan – $10/mo Premium Plus Plan – $23/mo
Use the coupon code “ALLLANGUAGERESOURCES” to save 25% on a subscription.
For this review, I spent about five days trying out SpanishPod101’s Premium Plan.
…SpanishPod101 Review – Good Content with Some Pointless ExtrasRead More »
- SpanishVIP Review — Unlimited Online Classes
SpanishVIP
Summary
SpanishVIP is a service that connects students and teachers of Spanish for online video lessons. It offers an “unlimited lessons” model for a monthly subscription and could be extremely cost effective for learners that take several lessons per week. It’s best suited for learners of Latin American Spanish at any level that want to improve their listening and speaking skills. It might not be the best fit if you’re mostly interested in Iberian Spanish or if you live in an Asian time zone.
The teachers are well trained and the materials are of high quality.
You can really study whatever you like; the teachers are focused on helping you achieve your own specific goals.
If you can take enough classes each week, the price is excellent.
I Like
- Highly-personalized classes.
- Great teachers.
- It’s affordable.
I Don’t Like
- There could be scheduling limitations for some students.
Price
In total there are 9 different subscription options with SpanishVIP: three for group classes, three for private classes, and three for SpanishVIP+ classes . Group classes come with a 7-day free trial, though you’ll still have to provide payment information upfront.
Group Classes – 1 Month: $99 3 Months: $249 6 Months: $399.
Private Classes – 1 Month: $149 3 Months: $399 6 Months: $699.
SpanishVIP+ Classes – 1 Month: $249, 3 Months: $649, 6 Months: $1,195.
Mention ALR to get a free month of group classes with any private class purchase.
There’s something about getting a human involved that is still unbeatable when it comes to language learning.
… - Speaky Review: Better Than Other Language Exchange Apps?
Speaky
Summary
Speaky is a social language-learning app for people interested in language exchange. It’s available for iOS, Android, and the web. Users can chat with other language learners, share photos, leave voice messages or even have voice calls. The basic features on Speaky are free to use, but access to more than five translations per day requires a subscription.
There are some dedicated language learners on Speaky but not as many as similar apps.
The platform is easy to use but lacks advanced features.
Speaky is mostly free to use, extra features are available for a subscription.
I Like
- It’s mostly free.
- It’s easy to use.
- There are a lot of users.
- There are tons of languages
I Don’t Like
- Many community members don’t actually seem interested in language exchange.
- The web version doesn’t work well.
- There are no extra social features.
Price
The basic features on Speaky are free to use. A premium membership is available for a subscription.
Speaky is a language exchange app. It facilitates exchange by allowing users to chat with others in the language they’re learning. Its function is pretty simple and straightforward — search for a partner with a reciprocal language combination and say hello.
…Speaky Review: Better Than Other Language Exchange Apps?Read More »
- Speechling Review – I Didn’t Know I Was Saying That Wrong!
Speechling
Summary
Speechling is a website and app that makes it easy to improve your speaking skills in several languages. The free version is an incredbily valuable resource that makes it easy to practice mimicking native speakers. The Unlimited Plan provides unlimited corrections of your recordings by a teacher.
Speachling makes it easy to improve your speaking rhythm and pronunciation.
Lots of different ways to practice speaking.
The free version is better than most paid resources and the paid version provides outstanding value.
I Like
- An excellent method to improve your speaking abilities and get feedback from a real teacher.
- Answer the Question, Describe the Image, and Freestyle mode are great for higher levels.
- You can switch languages at any time. I like seeing translations in my second language while studying my third language.
- Truly unlimited recordings with quick feedback.
I Don’t Like
- Absolute Beginners should learn the basics elsewhere first.
- You’ll need to learn how to make the sounds of your target language on your own.
- The amount of time given to record sentences can be too short.
Price
The Forever Free Plan is complete free. A monthly subscription to the Unlimited Plan costs $19.99 per month.
Click the link to save 10% on Speechling’s Unlimited Plan.
Speechling has quickly become one of my favorite language learning resources. The free version includes a ton of useful features and the premium plan is great value for the cost.
…Speechling Review – I Didn’t Know I Was Saying That Wrong!Read More »
- StoryLeaning Spanish Uncovered In-depth Review: One-of-a-kind and Surprisingly Effective & Enjoyable
StoryLearning Uncovered Courses
Summary
StoryLeaning Spanish Uncovered (and the similar German, French, Italian and Japanese courses) come from Olly Richards, the creator of the super popular blog I Will Teach You A Language. It’s quite a bit different than most courses as it revolves around a story. It can be a bit more challenging than other courses, as you begin reading somewhat long texts right off the bat. Overall, I found it to be a more fun way to approach language learning that will be great for some but not ideal for others.
The instruction is clear but can have too much information crammed into a single lesson.
You’ll practice every aspect of the language.
It has a pretty high price, but if you stick with it, you’ll get good value from it.
I Like
- Centering the lessons around a story makes learning more fun.
- Good clear instruction with lots of opportunities to practive what you’ve learned.
- Gets students to actively participate and take control of their own learning.
I Don’t Like
- Too many unrelated grammar points are included in the grammar lessons.
- The review quiz is too short.
Price
A one-time purchase costs $297, or for Japanese, $397. There’s also a 7-day free trial.
Olly Richards, the creator of the popular blog I Will Teach You A Language has also created several language learning courses.
… - StudySpanish.com Review: Don’t Pay For Their Camino Del Éxito Course
StudySpanish.com – Camino Del Éxito
Summary
StudySpanish.com has some useful free materials on their website, but their paid products should be avoided. Their Camino del Éxito audio course is a near exact copy of the free FSI Basic Spanish Course. They also have a separate subscription plan but none of the extra materials found within it are very useful and definitely not worth paying for.
Their vocabulary lessons in the subscription are especially bad.
It’s a thorough course but not their own.
Same material is available for free but their recordings are higher quality.
I Like
- The audio recordings are better than the FSI course.
- They have a lot of helpful free materials.
I Don’t Like
- They’re charging $200 for a course that’s available for free.
- None of the materials included in the subscription plan are much better than what they give away for free.
- It just feels so sketchy to call it your course when it was created by others. At least be honest about it.
Price
Subscription starts at $9.99 monthly or $119 for a lifetime subscription.
StudySpanish.com is a resource that lots of Spanish learners come across, in large part, because they offer a ton of free materials – much of which is quite good.
…StudySpanish.com Review: Don’t Pay For Their Camino Del Éxito CourseRead More »
- Synergy Spanish Review – Boring, Old, And Overpriced
Synergy Spanish
Summary
Synergy Spanish is an often-recommended course, but I found it to be old, overpriced, boring, and not as good as competitors. The good side is that their lessons force you to start speaking right away. Even with a limited vocabulary, you’ll be able to express a lot of different things. Still, I wouldn’t recommend using it.
Fairly well structured but feels outdated.
It may not be meant to be the most comprehensive course, but I’m shocked at some of the things that weren’t included.
I don’t think it’s as good as cheaper alternatives.
I Like
- Start speaking Spanish from the first lesson.
- The content builds upon itself pretty well.
- If you use it, you’ll learn quite a bit.
I Don’t Like
- The platform and some of the content taught in the lesson feels outdated.
- The content is among the most boring I’ve seen.
- It’s more expensive and not as good as competitors in my opinion.
Price
Synergy Light costs $67 and includes the audio lessons. Synergy Video costs $97 and adds in video lessons and email coaching. Synergy Video + CDs costs $145 and adds in CDs and printed out pdf.
Synergy Spanish Review – Boring, Old, And OverpricedRead More »
- Tandem Review: A Tinder-esque Language Exchange App?
Tandem
Summary
Tandem is a popular language exchange app with over one million active users. It’s available for iOS and Android and aims to bring language learners from all over the world together. It’s largely centered around its chat capabilities and language tools that facilitate communication, but there is also a tutoring service offered in the app.
There are lots of active language learners, especially those looking to pair with native English speakers.
The interface is intuitive and the language tools are simple and effective, though you’ll quickly run out of free translations.
The free version is all most people will need. Tandem Pro doesn’t add a ton of extra value.
I Like
- There are plenty of language partners
- The interface is easy to use and attractive
- The free version offers a lot of value
I Don’t Like
- You’ll need to use other learning resources as well
- Though Tandem has some safety features, you may encounter people using the app as a dating tool
Price
There is a limited free version of Tandem and a pro version available at $6.99 for one month, $10.67/month for three months, and $6.67/month for a year’s subscription.
Tandem Review: A Tinder-esque Language Exchange App?Read More »
- Transparent Language Review – Not Exciting, But Language Offering Is So Vast That You May Need It
Last Updated on December 13, 2023.
Transparent Language
Summary
Transparent Language markets itself as “the most complete language-learning system for independent learners.” While there are lots of different exercises for you to work through in their Essentials Course, I thought that the material wasn’t all that helpful and that it got very repetitive. Although the courses might not be all that useful or in-depth, with over a hundred languages on offer it might be worth checking out if you want to learn the very basics of a more obscure language such as Buriat, Kazakh or Turkmen.
While the exercises are for the most part well-designed, diverse and easy to use, it is the core material itself that I found lacking.
I hardly came across any explanations at all; practice was almost exclusively memorizing words and phrases.
I would only consider using if I was studying a very rare language.
I Like
- I really like the fact that they offer up courses in languages that are usually overlooked.
- It’s pretty well-designed, easy to use and has lots of different activities to work through.
I Don’t Like
- The core material is severely lacking in my opinion; it’s hard for me to imagine you’ll learn much grammar or how to form even a basic sentence yourself.
- It gets very repetitive and so I didn’t find it that fun to work through.
- You learn virtually nothing about the different cultural contexts of the languages you’re learning.
- Their teaching methodology was the biggest issue for me, leaving you memorizing lots of words and phrases in isolation.
Price
There is a free two-week trial period for you to try it out. Otherwise, it is $24.95 per month or $149.95 for a whole year if you just select one language. If you want access to all of the languages it is then $49.95 per month and $249.95 a year.
- uTalk Review – For Beginners Who Want To Learn Key Words & Phrases
uTalk
Summary
uTalk is a software program and mobile app offering learning material in over 140 languages. Its approach is based on learning keywords and phrases through gameplay. It covers a wide range of phrases, each spoken by a female and male native speaker, consequently offering listening and pronunciation practice. uTalk is most useful for beginners who want to get started in a language by learning key phrases. It could also be useful for intermediates looking to fill gaps in their vocabulary and pronunciation, but it does not offer any in-depth language instruction or grammar explanations. It’s also worth mentioning that for some languages, such as Basque, the occasional overly literal translation leads to small errors and unnatural phrasing creeping in. However, we haven’t seen instances in which this would result in you being misunderstood, and there’s no denying uTalk’s value for languages with fewer learning resources.
The app is very user-friendly, and the content is mostly useful, but little variation in practice activities can become repetitive.
The app does a good job of teaching key words and phrases, but review opportunities aren’t as transparent or comprehensive as they could be.
The price is very low, there’s a lot of content, and the right learner could get some serious practical use out of the resource.
I Like
- The number of languages on offer is staggering.
- Each phrase is recorded by a male and female native speaker. This was especially helpful in learning pronunciation.
- You frequently get to hear recordings of yourself producing the language. I found this motivating and informative.
I Don’t Like
- The Memory Game exercise felt like a waste of time. It’s difficult to get a perfect score even if you know the language well.
- I kept wishing there was a way to choose which phrases I could practice in games instead of them being randomly selected.
Price
$11.99 a month that can be cancelled anytime. 6 months costs $59.99 and for one year it is $99.99.
This was my first encounter with uTalk, so I didn’t know what to expect before trying it out. A quick search on the internet showed third-party reviews saying everything from “It’s just ok” to “Become fluent in another language with uTalk.” My experience was something much closer to the former.
…uTalk Review – For Beginners Who Want To Learn Key Words & PhrasesRead More »
- Verbling Review: Online Classes With Helpful Revision Tools
Verbling
Summary
Verbling is an online language-class marketplace where you can take lessons with teachers of your choice. It has some student-friendly extra features, including a built-in online classroom, flashcards, homework calendar, and a filing system for lesson materials. There are also useful but disorganized forums where you can discuss languages, share writing for critique, and do free language drills and exercises.
The lessons are generally high quality and well structured, plus the filters make it easy to find teachers who specialize in everything from accent reduction to interview preparation.
However, it can be slightly pricier than alternatives, so if you’re on a tight budget, you may want to look elsewhere. It also has fewer languages than some of the bigger competitors, so it might not be a good choice if you want to study Azerbaijani, Khmer, or Yoruba.
There are some less experienced teachers, but I found the lessons to be more consistently high quality than on italki.
The classroom technology, flashcards, and filing system are fantastic for learners and easy to use.
Some teachers charge more than on italki, but you get better classroom technology, more privacy, and fewer disorganized teachers.
I Like
- I quickly found great teachers.
- The platform’s extra features, such as teacher-made, personalized flashcards, help you review the material learned in each lesson.
- It seems focused on long-term progression as well as immediate student satisfaction.
- You don’t have to give out your contact details, thanks to the classroom technology.
I Don’t Like
- Some teachers don’t use the platform’s flashcards and materials system.
- There are fewer languages available than on italki.
- You can only pay in US dollars, plus there’s a hidden fee.
- The forums need more moderation.
Price
Prices are set by the teacher and range from $5 to $75 for an hour-long lesson. You can get discounts for buying packs of 5, 10, or 20 lessons with a teacher. Every student gets one free trial lesson, after which they’re $6 each.
I’ve got a confession to make: italki is one of my least favorite online language-learning resources. However, it was my go-to option for a long time, and I understand why people love it: it’s cheap, has teachers in nearly every language imaginable, and the app has a bunch of extra community features.
…Verbling Review: Online Classes With Helpful Revision ToolsRead More »
- Word Dive Review: Falls Short Compared To Similar Apps
Word Dive
Summary
Word Dive uses artificial intelligence and short exercises to help language learners commit study items to long-term memory. The app provides instruction in ten languages and is available for desktop, iOS, and Android.
It’s very easy to use, but I thought the material was limited.
You can practice vocabulary and grammar, but there are almost no grammar explanations.
It isn’t very expensive, but other resources are similarly priced and more comprehensive.
I Like
- It’s convenient for mobile language practice
- It’s fun to use
- Partial credit answers motivate you to stretch yourself
I Don’t Like
- There are almost no grammar explanations.
- I found the exercises repetitive.
Price
A subscription starts at $9.99. For 3 months it is $27.99. 6 months $47.99. 12 months $79.99.
Combine a strong affinity for things under the sea and a desire to make the lives of language learners easier, and you might produce something similar to Word Dive.
…Word Dive Review: Falls Short Compared To Similar AppsRead More »
- Yabla Review — Affordable and Effective Video-Learning
Yabla
Summary
Yabla is a language-learning platform that uses videos with interactive subtitles and language games to help users learn a language. It’s currently available on the web and for iOS, with an Android app in development. Its videos are of varying difficulty levels and types, and are either sourced from the internet or originally produced, but all videos use native speakers.
It’s very easy and enjoyable to use, but the flashcard feature could be more developed.
While they vary slightly for each language, the video libraries are extensive and full of interesting content.
It’s most valuable for learners at the intermediate and advanced levels and is priced very fairly, but you’ll only get access to one language.
I Like
- It’s very affordable.
- The review activities are enjoyable and varied.
- You can filter content by region.
- There are plenty of interesting and varied videos.
I Don’t Like
- Audio in some review activities is robotic.
- No speaking practice.
- Translations don’t take context into account.
Price
After a 15-day free trial, users can subscribe to one of the following options:
One month: $12.95 Six months: $54.95 One year: $99.95
The best learning resources are the ones you actually enjoy using. This makes video-learning super appealing — who doesn’t enjoy videos?
…Yabla Review — Affordable and Effective Video-LearningRead More »
MiniReviews of Spanish Online Language Learning Resources
- 1001 Reasons to Learn Spanish Mini Review: Just Excellent
1001 Reasons to Learn Spanish
Price:
Free, Courses cost €60 and €49
Summary
Juan Fernández used to teach Spanish at University College London and has since developed his blog, 1001 Reasons to Learn Spanish. This website offers activities, courses, additional material for his graded reader series, and his podcast, Español con Juan. You will also find videos from his YouTube channel incorporated into various grammar and vocabulary activities. All of his resources are entirely in Spanish, but they support beginner to advanced learners. Juan is an animated teacher who uses props and gestures in his YouTube videos to increase understanding. In his podcasts, he speaks at a relatively natural speed and includes a full transcript of each episode. His recordings from his home have a better sound quality and are more structured than those that are recorded while he is out walking. His free course on improving Spanish in 30 days supports upper A2 learners to improve their Spanish and prepare for the B1 level. It is designed to encourage 20-30 minutes of study per day and provides vocabulary and grammar in context. There are videos, grammar explanations, and quizzes, and the content difficulty increases weekly. Overall, Juan seems dedicated to improving his viewer’s Spanish, and his years of experience as a Spanish teacher shows in the quality of his material.
- 101 Script Writing App Mini Review: Good for Indian Languages
101 Script Writing App
Price:
Freemium; one-off payment of $1.30 for full access
Summary
Kannada 101, Tamil 101, Telugu 101, Marathi 101, Bengali 101: these are just some of the apps from developer Uma Loganathan. You can also download Arabic 101, Vietnamese 101, and even English 101 and German 101. If you’re learning these languages, though, we’d take a look at Write Me instead. We feel that the Write Me app is generally a more well-designed option, especially since it also tests you on your ability to match the right character to an audio recording. However, the Write Me app barely has any Indian languages, and that’s where the 101 series shines. You’ll be able to trace the characters; switch between easy, normal, and freestyle modes; and receive a score out of 100. The stroke order and direction are clearly explained. Whenever you make a mistake, you receive instant feedback: the music stops and the “ink” stops flowing. This allows you to self-correct immediately, rather than practicing it wrong. The series has its flaws: like with most apps, you won’t learn how to join up characters. However, we think it’s a useful tool for beginners.
- 50 Languages Mini-Review: Basically an online phrasebook
50Languages
Price:
Free
Summary
It is clear that 50Languages aims to make language learning accessible to anyone with an internet connection There is no signup required to use the site, so its resources are both free, and anonymous. You can find 100 free downloadable audio files of native speakers and ‘lessons’ in over 50 languages, in addition to vocabulary, alphabets, quizzes, and games. Unfortunately, none of these resources follow a cohesive learning path, nor does the platform help you memorize any of the information provided. Only one section, the Translation Trainer, aims to help you retain phrases. However, if you have saved phrases in multiple languages, all of them will be bunched together into one review without an indication of which language you should be translating into. The audio files and phrasebook lessons contain a series of phrases that do not seem to build on what you have previously learned; learning from this website is essentially like referencing a phrasebook you might buy for a trip to another country. 50Languages has a lot of information available, but it doesn’t seem like it can be used as a standalone language resource. Perhaps you can take phrases and vocabulary that interest you and compiled them into an Anki deck to help with retention.
- A.C. Quintero Mini-Review: Graded Reader Adventure Series
A.C. Quintero
Price:
Books range from $4.03 – $8.00
Summary
A.C. Quintero has written a series of Spanish graded readers for beginners. Most of the books focus on adventures beyond the everyday norm, which may appeal to mystery lovers. Each book’s language level is not clearly identified, but there seem to be four main books for beginners that gradually increase in difficulty: Las Apariencias Engañan (300 unique words), El Escape (350 unique words), El Armario (400 unique words), and Las Sombras (500 Unique words). Two other books (Las apariencias engañan and El Último Viaje) have unidentified reading levels, but you can read a sample on Amazon to see if they are appropriate for you. A.C. Quintero’s books seem to be effective at helping you review basic concepts, and each book adds a manageable number of new words to increase your vocabulary. They probably aren’t as engaging as the Read It! Or ESLC series, which retell famous plots in simplified Spanish, but A.C. Quintero’s storylines seem to carry more emotion and complexity than those of Paco Ardit or Lingo Mastery.
- Accelerated Spanish Mini-Review: Learning Through Mnemonics
Accelerated Spanish
Price:
Freemium, Paid plans start at $87/mo
Summary
Accelerated Spanish is unique to other programs in that it emphasizes learning through mnemonic techniques, helping organize Spanish vocabulary in a ‘Memory Palace’ and fitting every word you learn into a natural sentence construct. The program itself consists of 12 free comprehensive beginner lessons in neutral Latin American Spanish, with quizzes, practice materials, flash cards, and a workbook. At the end of these lessons, there is an option to pay for more personalized content with their coaching program, which provides pronunciation feedback, assignment corrections, and custom lessons. The Coaching program will help you develop concrete goals, guiding you to expressing yourself like a native speaker, even if you do not yet have an extensive vocabulary. This may seem counterintuitive, but the program provides you with a strong enough foundation that you will be able to use Spanish to describe the words you have not yet learned. Accelerated Spanish is part of Master of Memory, which researches effective learning methods and sharing their discoveries with the world.
- AmazingTalker Mini Review: Not Our Top Pick for Web Classes
AmazingTalker
Price:
From around $10 per 50-minute class
Summary
AmazingTalker is an italki and Verbling competitor that lets you book classes with language teachers and academic tutors of your choice. It has a lot of attractive features for students, but teachers complain about high commission rates and lack of support. It boasts a 3% acceptance rate for teachers and a 100% satisfaction guarantee. If you’re not happy with your class, they’ll rebook you another one for free. There are lots of teachers to choose from, or you can also use their AI Matching Service to find a tutor. The teachers’ profiles include videos, reviews, and their résumé. However, AmazingTalker doesn’t seem a great choice for teachers. It charges English and Japanese teachers astonishingly high commission rates of up to 30%. While these rates fall as teachers earn more through the site, they have to make $1,500 a month before the commission reaches levels comparable to italki and Verbling. Making it worse, there’s an additional 8% fee for payment processing and tax that all teachers have to pay, no matter what language they teach. There have also been complaints on Reddit from teachers claiming to have been harassed by students and fellow teachers. However, we cannot corroborate these. Given all this, we’d recommend trying italki (review) or Verbling (review) first. Alternatively, check out our guide to the best platforms for online language classes.
- Anki Mini-Review: The Go-To SRS Flashcard App
Anki
Price:
Free
Summary
It is the go-to app for free (except on iOS) Spaced Repetition System (SRS) flashcards. It has a simple user interface with various features that more hard-core users can dive into if they choose. Your flashcards will appear according to your natural forgetting curve; the app will test you in increasingly spaced out intervals, with more difficult cards appearing more than once in a session, while easier cards spacing out over weeks — or even months and years. An SRS system is the most effective way to drive information into your long-term memory. The cards can sync between the web, desktop app, and mobile versions to keep your flashcards updated and with you at all times. You can add images and audio clips to your cards and change the text formatting (if you use it on your computer). One feature unique to Anki, as opposed to other SRS flashcard apps, is the “Cloze deletion” function, which allows you to block out parts of your card and create a “fill-in-the-blanks” type card format. If you want a resource for how to make effective flashcards, check out the book, FluentForever. The author leaves a whole section dedicated to understanding how to use your Anki deck to advance your skills quickly.
- Audiria Mini-Review: Good Quality Content When it Hasn’t Been Deleted
audiria
Price:
Free
Summary
Audiria’s podcasts are structured like lessons, with about 20 different topics to choose from. They focus on humour, art, short scenes, songs, and books, not to mention slow podcasts and podcasts for beginners. On Audriria‘s website, each podcast contains a full transcript with exercises and tests, allowing you to fill in the blanks, put sentences in order, and choose the right sentence to fill the transcript. Unfortunately, the interface is not very user friendly and the layout makes it difficult to navigate some of the activities: sometimes the images don’t load on the test pages, and often you will find that your chosen podcast has been deleted from the source. Audiria has good-quality and helpful content, but the website makes it less desirable to use. If you can find a podcast that has not been deleted, then it may be worth checking out, but other podcast-based resources have more consistent quality and reliable platforms. Spanishpod101, Unlimited Spanish, Notes in Spanish, and Spanish Obsessed are just a few other options.
- Bab.la Mini-Review: Use WordReference or Linguee Instead
bab.la
Price:
Free
Summary
Bab.la is a bilingual dictionary for 28 different languages. Their site includes quizzes, games, grammar lessons, phrasebooks, and a forum for users to discuss language learning. You can also look up various verbs in the conjugation tables or find synonyms and examples of how to use words in context. Their quizzes should be taken with a grain of salt — If your purpose is to familiarize yourself with vocabulary and grammar structures, then these are probably a fun way to explore your target language. However, if your purpose is to understand the target language’s culture, beware of any quiz that touches on romance, as the advice is similar to that of the magazines found in grocery store checkout lines. Bab.la may be okay for general definitions, but other sites will probably help you dive further into different languages. Linguee provides examples of words in context sourced from articles and research papers in the target language, and Forvo has millions of words pronounced by native speakers in hundreds of languages. Also, check out WordReference (for a more relevant database of example sentences), Pleco (for Chinese learners), or SpanishDict (For Spanish learners or Spanish-speaking English learners).
- Beelinguapp Mini-Review: Reading & Listening Practice
Beelinguapp
Price:
Freemium, $29.99/year
Summary
Beelinguapp makes it easier to read and listen to interesting content in a number of languages. You’ll find short stories, news, fairy tales, music, and more. Their side-by-side reading functionality highlights the sentence in the language you’re learning, as well as in a language you’re familiar with. The karaoke feature makes it easy to follow the audio with the written text. Some of the content and features are available for free, but there are also premium plans to unlock more.
- Bilingual Oxford Dictionaries Mini Review: Handy Apps
Oxford Dictionaries
Price:
Free
Summary
Oxford Dictionary has published numerous bilingual dictionaries over the years, many of which are not designed to be comprehensive. While some are “complete” dictionaries, others are called “mini”, “concise”, “essential” or even “shorter”. Even the smaller ones are pretty thorough, however. The Oxford Mini Greek dictionary contains 40,000 words and phrases, many of which also contain multiple translations. It’s a lot shorter than the Oxford Hindi dictionary, at 100,000 entries, or the New Oxford American English Dictionary at 350,000 – but it’s still got a wider vocabulary than the average English speaker. You can purchase the books themselves, but most learners will prefer the convenience of the apps with their regular updates and learner-friendly features. Search Autocomplete, Fuzzy Filter, Wild Card and Voice Search help you find words you don’t know how to spell. Favourites help you save useful words and phrases, while Word of the Day will introduce you to new words. Some dictionaries also contain audio recordings and thesauruses. And the freemium Oxford Dictionary with Translator will translate words and paragraphs to and from 14 languages. For some languages, learners already have plenty of free, thorough dictionaries available to them. Spanish learners, for example, will probably prefer to combine the free apps SpanishDict and Diccionario RAE (Google Play, App Store). Mandarin Chinese learners will likely find Pleco more useful. But for some languages, these dictionaries may well be the most thorough and reliable ones available.
The rating is our best guess, but we haven’t yet had the opportunity to fully test and review this resource.
- Bite Size Languages Mini-Review: Good for Beginners
Bite Size Languages
Price:
$99 per course
Summary
Bite size language was developed by the creator of the Actual Fluency Podcast. Each of the 5 languages consists of 100 lessons for beginners to develop their listening comprehension and pronunciation. You will learn grammar within the context of short dialogues and acquire relevant every-day vocabulary. Each lesson seems doable within a 15-25 minute study session; they contain lesson notes, transcripts, translations, vocabulary, and a grammar section. It seems like the dialogues speed up slightly as you advance through the lessons, but the final lessons do not reach a natural speed. This is understandable, however, as the program is aimed at beginners who have little or no exposure to the language (you can listen to some sound clips from various lessons here). You may be expected to repeat every lesson a few dozen times to get the most out of the course. If you are studying Russian, the creator emphasizes that you don’t need to learn the Russian alphabet because the dialogues are the core of the lessons. But, all of the accompanying materials, including transcripts of the dialogues, are written in Russian.
- Bluebird Languages Mini-Review: Over 160 Languages Available
Bluebird Languages
Price:
Free, Premium subscriptions cost $13.99/mo, $144.99/year
Summary
Bluebird Languages has several types of lessons you can choose from, including a daily lesson, core vocabulary, essential verbs, creating sentences, powerful phrases, and conversation. Each topic seems to have a beginner, intermediate, and advanced lesson, although it’s not clear how advanced “advanced” is. In each lesson, an English-speaking narrator will ask you to listen to and repeat translations of various phrases. The recordings in each language seem to use native speakers’ voices, which is quite the feat considering they have lessons in over 160 languages. Bluebird Languages’ phrases don’t construct a replicable dialogue, so the phrases don’t seem to have a lot of context other than the topic at hand. Furthermore, the topics seem to be identical in all languages, so most of the phrases will not be culture-specific. They also don’t break down complicated pronunciation, but you can try to break it down yourself by slowing down the recording to 0.5x speed. Bluebird Languages seems similar to Pimsleur but appears less organized and will probably not improve your communication abilities as quickly. Nevertheless, it may be a good free alternative for beginners, and the program will probably help you develop some confidence in speaking languages that have less challenging pronunciation. The conversation and personalized lessons require a monthly membership, but there is enough free content that these add-ons may not be necessary.
- Brainscape Mini-Review: Adaptive Flashcards
Brainscape
Price:
Freemium, Premium subscriptions start at $9.99/mo
Summary
Brainscape is a flashcard app that uses a Spaced Repetition System, also often referred to as ‘adaptive flashcards’, to help you memorize new vocabulary and facts. It has a team of scientists, engineers, and education experts working to optimize their program for effective learning. Brainscape is quite similar to Anki, but has a more modern and colourful interface. They also have Certified Classes, which are decks that seem to have been developed by experts in the chosen topic. The app adds what they call Intelligent Cumulative Exposure (ICE) to some of their Certified Classes; it seems to combine a Spaced Repetition System with gradually introducing new concepts, increasing the difficulty of the concepts, and providing context so you can build your own sentences. It has several Certified Classes for various languages (and other topics), and many more decks created by users. Unlike Anki, edits that creators make to user decks seem to sync up even after you have downloaded the deck. With the free version, you have limited access to premium decks but unlimited access to user-made decks.
- Bravolol Phrasebooks Mini-Review: Consider Other Options
Bravolol Phrasebooks
Price:
$ 0.00
Summary
Bravolol Phrasbook’s positive reception in the app store may be surprising given the endless availability of quality resources on the internet today. The app divides topics into categories such as Emergency, Common, Greetings, Health, and Romance. When you enter each category, you can listen to a native speaker pronounce each sentence at two different speeds. Once you have favourited some sentences, you can listen to all of them read aloud in order, or review them in order by reading the English phrase and guessing the Spanish translation. One of Bravolol’s redeeming features is that you can record your voice and compare your recording with that of the native speaker, although this comparison is achieved by your personal ability to discern between the differences. Although slightly more expensive, SimplyLearn is a phrasebook app that has an attractive interface, more phrases to choose from, and also does a better job of helping you remember new phrases by using SRS flashcards — it also supports significantly more languages. Other free phrasebook websites include LingoHut and 50Languages. Even though we have given them relatively low ratings, they still seem more comprehensive than Bravolol Phrasebooks.
- Butterfly Spanish Mini-Review: Dynamic and Educational
Butterfly Spanish
Price:
$ 0.00
Summary
Butterfly Spanish is free, but it relies on donations to keep the channel running. Ana, the founder, has a dynamic personality that inspires enthusiasm to learn. She covers topics for beginner, intermediate, and advanced students (although the videos seem most suitable for beginners), supporting you to build vocabulary, understand grammar, and improve pronunciation. Ana’s goal is to teach you the Spanish that native speakers use every day, not the textbook-style conversations you find in class. Unfortunately, Ana does use a lot of English in her lessons, but this shouldn’t dissuade the immersive learner from checking out her channel. Ana will ensure that you fully understand the topic she presents — she provides lots of examples to reinforce what she teaches and uses a giant whiteboard to keep all the information in one place. If you have a topic in mind (such as how to use the verb ‘dejar’ or ‘me gusta’), check out her channel to see if she can help — there are over 100 videos available, with more on the way.
- CaptionPop Mini-Review: Use The Free Version
Caption Pop
Price:
Free, Premium subscriptions start at $10/mo
Summary
With CaptionPop you can use YouTube videos to pursue your language learning endeavours using subtitles in both your target language and native language. Tap a single key to repeat the last caption, slow down the playback speed, and bookmark subtitles to study with SRS interactive flashcards. The flashcards will not just have you memorize words, but practice dictations with immediate feedback on your accuracy. Unfortunately there are currently some bugs in the programming, and you may only hear part of the caption you are being asked to transcribe. You can search for Youtube videos in your target language within the CaptionPop platform, but only those videos with subtitles in both your target language and your native language are available. This means that you will rely on captions translated and transcribed by the video’s creators, which improves your language learning experience but restricts the amount of available Youtube content. Nevertheless, there is a good amount of content from popular channels in more common languages. The free version of the platform combined with self-made Anki cards may be a better option than subscribing to the premium version, as the bugs in CaptionPop’s programming may not be worth the monthly payment.
- Complete Language Lessons Mini Review: Almost Useless
Complete Language Lessons
Price:
$8.99 for the CD/$1.29 per track on Amazon, free on Spotify
Summary
Complete Language Lessons has audio courses for numerous languages on Amazon, Spotify, and Deezer. We tried out the Swahili audio course, Learn Swahili Easily, Effectively, and Fluently – and were extremely disappointed. The audio tracks we sampled consist of Swahili phrases repeated over and over again, with no translations, explanations, or anything in English. The audio quality isn’t great, either, and the occasional muted club music adds to the bizarreness. It feels to us like the audio tracks are supposed to accompany a textbook, but we couldn’t find one. If one existed at some point, we suspect it’s no longer available. If you already speak the language and are looking for native audio recordings to help you improve your listening and pronunciation, you might get some value out of Complete Language Lessons. However, if your aim is learn the language, we would skip these CDs.
- Conjuguemos Mini-Review: Effective Language Drilling
Conjuguemos
Price:
Free
Summary
Conjugemos is a website that drills verb conjugations, vocabulary, and grammar. You can choose to either drill different skills through typing the answers in a flashcard-like system, or through various games such as crosswords, memory, word search, and multiplayer games. While it is free for anyone to use, additional resources are available to teachers through a paid plan. It should be noted that although the site technically supports Korean learners, the Korean section only has one activity in the present tense.
- Conjuverb Mini-Review: Good If You Want Verbs In One Place
conjuverb
Price:
$0.99
Summary
Conjuverb is a Spanish conjugation dictionary app with over 1600 fully conjugated verbs. It has a flashcard function that allows you to make custom lists or choose from pre-made decks to test your recall. Judging by their announcements, the developers seem to have a good sense of humour that may pleasantly seep into various areas of the app. Conjuverb was a big deal in the world of Spanish apps back in 2013, but it doesn’t seem to have kept up with the resources of today — mainly because it doesn’t seem to use a Spaced Repetition System for its flashcards, but also because the information in the app is now freely accessible on SpanishDict. You can also subscribe to Brainscape for access to decks that will teach you all the verb tenses and much more. If you don’t want to spend a lot of money but genuinely need an app that focuses entirely on verb conjugations, this would be a fine app to use. Otherwise, check out the previously mentioned resources.
- Conversations by StoryLearning Mini-Review: There are Cheaper Options
Conversations – IWTYAL
Price:
$197
Summary
Conversations by I Will Teach You a Language is a downloadable program that uses Comprehensible input (CI) as a strategy to improve your language level. Comprehensible input is when you consume second language material that is just above your current level, which in IWTYAL’s case, is about A2-B1 on the CEFR scale. The Conversations program includes material of a manageable length with full transcripts and English translations. It is 20 chapters long and follows six characters, two of whom have just moved to the countryside from the big city. You will listen to realistic dialogues between the characters and learn everyday colloquialisms and slang. The characters have a variety of accents within each language, and they speak at a relatively natural speed. The series has the same content in each language, but there are variations based on cultural differences. IWTYAL probably has good quality materials, but it is quite expensive compared to other CI resources. Intermediate learners can check out innerFrench, Japanese With Noriko, Russian With Max, and Dreaming Spanish for some high-quality, free alternatives. Chinese learners might want to check out Du Chinese and The Chairman’s Bao for graded readers with audio.
- Cooljugator Mini-Review: Conjugations For Uncommon Languages
cooljugator
Price:
$ 0.00
Summary
Cooljugator is a free online verb conjugation dictionary for over 40 languages, with special attention to languages without existing free resources. Besides conjugated forms, the website also provides examples, English translations, pronunciation hints, related verbs, and more. On each page, you can also read the translation for your chosen verb into every other language available on the site. Unfortunately, there are no audio files to help you with pronunciation, but maybe that will change in the future. You can directly search for conjugations, or if you’re looking for inspiration, every language has a list of the most common verbs to choose from. On that same page, you can read some facts and a brief overview of what verb conjugation looks like in your chosen language. Although Cooljugator is 100% free, you can purchase the creator’s other project, Interlinear Books, to learn languages through stories. If you would like to practice verb conjugations for some common languages, check out Conjuguemos, another free resource with verb conjugation games. Also, SpanishDict is probably more appropriate for Spanish learners because of the extensive resources and activities that accompany their sections on verb conjugation.
- Coursera Mini Review: Great for Beginners, but Limited Options
Coursera
Price:
Free, with some courses starting at $39/month
Summary
Coursera has several paid and free online language courses developed by accredited universities. The quality of the courses varies, but the following recommendations have been well received — these courses are primarily for beginners who want an introduction to a new language. You can choose from a series of individual courses, or take a beginner specialization in Russian, Spanish, Mandarin, and Chinese HSK 1-3 (with additional individual HSK 4-6 courses). If you have just started, or haven’t yet started, learning Korean, Yonsei University has one course for absolute beginners, and another for those who have a basic grasp of Hangul. Saint Petersburg State University’s beginner Japanese course is probably not as effective as other resources that we might recommend instead, such as JapanesePod101 or Pimsleur. École Polytechnique offers the only French course on Coursera; it’s technically for B1-B2 learners, although B2 learners may find it too easy. Lastly, English learners can enjoy a specialization in intermediate grammar, advanced grammar, academic speaking and listening, or business English, If you are starting a language and enjoy structured courses with a (flexible) weekly schedule, Coursera is a great option — especially since Coursera offers financial aid for those who can’t afford to pay the course fees. Pair your studies with a tutor from italki or Verbling for speaking practice and you’ll be good to go!
- DeerPlus Mini Review: Fun Supplementary App
DeerPlus
Price:
Freemium; $8.99/month, $35.99/year, $59.99/lifetime
Summary
DeerPlus, also known as LingoDeer Plus, is a cute, gamified app from the makers of Lingodeer. It sets out to teach you words, phrases, and grammar through 11 different games, but it’s best used as a supplementary tool. You’ll drill vocabulary, build phrases, select the right particles, decide if a sentence is grammatically correct or not, do conjugation exercises, answer listening comprehension questions, and more. What you won’t do is learn the material prior to being tested like you do with LingoDeer (review), DeerPlus’ sister app. DeerPlus is a fun supplementary tool that would work well alongside most resources, but especially LingoDeer. However, it’s a shame that there aren’t SRS features in what is essentially a review app. A word of warning: you can study in a range of languages, but not all the games have been translated. We were shocked when we switched from studying Japanese via Spanish to Japanese via English and discovered grammar and “integrated” games in addition to the five vocabulary and phrase-based ones we had been playing.
- Destinos Mini-Review: Amazingly comprehensive for beginners
Destinos
Price:
Free
Summary
From the producers as the French video series, French in Action, Destinos is an award-winning beginner Spanish video course from the 1990s that will train your listening comprehension and speaking abilities. Each of the fifty-two 30-minute episodes follows a dramatic storyline of a lawyer investigating a family secret. Throughout the course, you will learn about Spanish-speaking cultures and accents in Spain, Argentina, Puerto Rico, and Mexico. Destinos seems to follow the Capretz Theory for language learning, throwing you into full immersion from day one. You shouldn’t worry if you have difficulty following the conversations between the characters; the context and body language of each episode should be enough to help you understand what’s happening. You will gradually be able to understand more as you listen, respond to the lawyer, Raquel’s, comprehension questions at the end of each episode, and complete the accompanying exercises that are linked below each video (be careful you don’t miss them — the text is quite small). Also, the Spanish-speaking narrators speak at a slower pace, so you will gradually be able to pick up new words through them as well. Nevertheless, if you’re struggling to keep up, try watching BBC’s series, Mi Vida Loca first, then dive into Destinos. Although the videos themselves are outdated, the developers seem to have kept up with current resources. The additional vocabulary, grammar, dictation, and multiple-choice activities contain external links at the end for supplement practice. Overall, Destinos provides an excellent introduction to Spanish. Please note that the original website may not be available in all countries, but you can find the episodes on YouTube and KET Education without the supplementary exercises.
- DLI Courses Mini-Review: Free With a Strong Focus on Pronunciation
DLI Courses
Price:
$ 0.00
Summary
The DLI and FSI language courses are still some of the most comprehensive resources for language learning today, and probably the most comprehensive free resources you will find. Although the DLI and FSI courses are comparable in quality, DLI courses focus more on military terminology in the later lessons, while FSI courses focus on everyday communication and communication for diplomats. Another key difference between them is that the DLI courses may go into more depth, and also seem to provide a more comprehensive guide to the study of each language; the FSI courses either have briefer explanations or dive straight into the content. Both of them have outdated content, which is understandable considering that they were developed in the mid-1900s and have scarcely been updated since then. Often the DLI courses outline clear practice strategies to reproduce your target language’s sounds. Also, depending on the language, literal translations are sometimes used so that you get accustomed to each language’s grammar structure. All the PDFs and audio files are available for download on various sites, although Live Lingua has made navigating between the material quite intuitive. If you can’t find your desired language in the DLI courses, check out the FSI courses for different options.
- Dreaming Spanish Mini-Review: Free Immersion From Zero
Dreaming Spanish
Price:
Free
Summary
Dreaming Spanish is a series of Youtube videos that have been transformed into a language-learning platform. Each video provides full Spanish immersion, even from the Super-Beginner level. Additionally, the speaking pace in each video increases depending on the level, which allows you to progressively improve your listening comprehension. The creator, Pablo, states that through listening, you will be able to naturally develop the accent, vocabulary, grammar, speaking abilities, and comprehension of a language. Dreaming Spanish publishes a new video every 3 days. The website automatically tracks how long you have spent watching its content, and you can sort by level, topic, or by which of the 15+ guides are presenting in the video. For those of you looking for a free, immersive method to study Spanish, you should definitely check out Dreaming Spanish.
- Easy Languages Mini-Review: Interviews Around The Globe
Easy Languages
Price:
$ 0.00
Summary
Easy Languages gets people involved from all around the globe —from Brazil to Mongolia — to film authentic interviews about everyday life with locals on the street. A typical episode format starts with the interviewer (or interviewers) introducing the topic and location for the day. Then, they will approach various locals to ask their opinion or test their knowledge. Only a handful of languages, like Hindi, and Swahili, don’t follow this format — these are also typically the languages with fewer videos. Easy Languages invites co-producers to join their channel, which means that anyone can apply to create videos, as long as they are filmed according to the Easy Languages guidelines. These co-producers receive multimedia training if they don’t already have experience in the field, so the videos typically have a baseline quality standard (although sometimes the filming can be a bit shaky). Most of the interviewers have a bubbly personality, and some of them appear in multiple language interviews within Easy Languages. Overall, the interviews are enjoyable and will train your ear to understand a range of voices and accents. Also, for anyone who uses Seedlang for German, you’ll be pleasantly surprised to see Cari’s friendly face in the Easy German episodes!
- edX Mini-Review: Worth It If You Audit, Maybe Not If You Pay
Edx
Price:
Freemium, prices vary
Summary
Like Coursera, many of edX’s courses were developed by accredited universities, and you can obtain certificates of completion at the end of your studies. Unlike Coursera, edX’s courses are all free to audit, non-profit, and open-source. It was originally founded by Harvard and MIT, and since then has been joined by universities around the globe. The Spanish and Italian courses in particular have many activities to reinforce your learning, including writing, reading, speaking, and listening activities. The Chinese course is less comprehensive, but could still teach you the basics if you don’t mind watching lots of videos — although, the Peking University courses on Coursera may be a better option. The Steps in Japanese series also includes lots of videos, but these videos are interactive and quiz you on the material. Overall, Coursera seems to have a better platform than edX, and their courses may be more intuitive to navigate. However, that shouldn’t stop you from trying out what edX has to offer, especially considering that you can get most of it for free. After you have learned the basics, you can enrich your knowledge through Open Learn’s free language courses.
- Ella Verbs Mini-Review: More Features than Other Free Apps
Ella Verbs
Price:
Freemium, Free trial, $5.99/mo, $28.99/year, $68.99/lifetime access
Summary
Ella verbs is a Spanish conjugation app for mobile devices. It supports both Latin American and European Spanish. When you first enter the app, it will ask you to identify your confidence level for a series of verb tenses, then it will place you in one of thirty levels. Each level explains a specific verb tense, then adds conjugation, translation, and timed multiple-choice activities. There is also a free conjugation dictionary — with a subscription, you can quiz yourself on each verb or create a custom quiz. Conjugation guides will pop up when you answer questions incorrectly, and the quizzes are designed to test you on previous mistakes. Only the first six levels are free, but there is a three-day free trial if you would like to test the whole program. If you don’t want to pay for an app, both SpanishDict and Conjuguemos are free options for Spanish verb conjugation activities. However, these resources won’t record which verbs you had difficulty with, so they are not as personalized.
- Elon.io Mini Review: A Bit Messy
Elon.io
Price:
Free
Summary
Elon.Io is a website that teaches basic Japanese, Turkish, and Spanish writing, vocabulary, and grammar. As you complete each lesson, a checkmark will appear beside it in the table of contents. You can also sign up for a free account to keep track of your progress. You can review concepts from your errors in the SRS quizzes, but these review lessons carry into every language. So, if you have reviews leftover from Japanese, you will review them during your Turkish and Spanish studies. In Japanese and Spanish, the lessons seem to build on one another. For example, you may learn some basic kanji and then use them in the next lesson with a new grammar concept. In Turkish, however, you will have to look at the “exercises” section of the lesson to succeed in the quizzes. Unfortunately, the lessons put a strong emphasis on translation, and the Japanese version often uses romaji instead of kana or kanji. Although it’s free, you might want to check out our other recommended resources first.
- Encore!!! Language Learning Mini-Review: Basically a Phrasebook
Encore!!! Language Learning
Price:
Free
Summary
Encore!!! Language Learning allows you to listen to playlists of common phrases, vocabulary, conjugations, and dialogues. It varies in terms of whether it uses native speakers or automated text-to-voice. The app is basically a phrasebook that allows you to practice translating sentences to and from your native language, or simply repeat after an audio in your target language. You can listen to a pre-made playlist, mute or unmute certain phrases within a playlist, adjust the number of repetitions of each phrase, or create your own playlist. You can also test your memory with the Test tool by reading prompts in your native language and translating into your target language. The app seems to focus more on understanding grammar structures than other phrasebook sites like Optilingo or Lingohut. Technically you could learn something by repeating the phrases aloud, but there are many other free apps that provide a clearer learning path and have a more intuitive interface than Encore!!! Language Learning.
- Entiende español como un C1 (Understand Spanish Like a C1) Mini Review: Excellent resource for learning different Spanish dialects
Entiende Español Como un C1 (Understand Spanish Like a C1)
Price:
$197 USD
Summary
Are you an upper intermediate or above level Spanish learner? Is understanding Spanish speakers your goal? Here is the resource that may help you overcome your comprehension difficulties regardless of the accent or speed of the speaker.
With UNDERSTAND SPANISH LIKE A C1 you will enhance your listening comprehension of 20 different dialects. You will learn accent traits and pronunciation particularities that can make it difficult for you to understand when you listen to a native Spanish speaker speak naturally. You will have five types of active listening practices with audio of real speech at natural speed, for a total of 400 exercises that will sharpen your ability to understand when you listen to Spanish. The training covers the most widespread varieties of Spanish, with 400 practices that progress progressively from the clearest to the most challenging, so that you continually improve. More than 65 hours of lessons and practices for less than what you pay for 12 hours of individual lessons.
It offers video explanations of pronunciation features which should help discern many different Spanish dialects. The courses are challenging, suitable for B2 or above Spanish learners only. - ESLC Short Novels for Beginners Mini-Review: Engaging for A2
ESLC Short Novels For Beginners
Price:
Kindle Books range from $2.28 – $3.10
Summary
The Easy Spanish Learning Centre, with Álvaro Parra Pinto, edits, simplifies, and translates well-known stories into Spanish for upper beginner learners (perhaps at the A2 level on the CEFR scale). The workbook series includes ten volumes of about 120 pages each, following stories such as The Canterville Ghost, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, The Picture of Dorian Gray and Gulliver’s Travels. The stories are engaging and will help you improve your reading abilities. At the end of each chapter, there are vocabulary lists (with some questionable English translations) and a variety of exercises to test your reading comprehension — and, if you go to the ESLC website link at the beginning of the book, you can get a free ebook with some tips on effective reading techniques. The dialogues use a noticeable number of exclamation points, which may be distracting at times, but this is more of a stylistic quirk rather than a pedagogical disadvantage. Overall the ESLC Short Novels provide over a thousand pages of engaging material for advanced beginners to start reading in Spanish.
- Español Automatico Mini-Review: A Natural, Manageable Speed
Español Automatico
Price:
Freemium, Courses cost between $23 -$347
Summary
Español Automático supports Spanish learners to dive into real-world Spanish. Their content seems well organized and high-quality, despite some of the courses being quite an investment. They have a free podcast with purchasable transcripts in addition to some online courses. As all of the content is entirely in Spanish and at a relatively natural speed, it is most suitable for intermediate or advanced learners. Nevertheless, the hard-core beginner may benefit from it as well. The podcast covers various topics, such as grammatical nuances and tips to advance your learning. The creators might explain (in Spanish) the difference between ‘the four porqués’, or they might help you overcome your fear of making mistakes. You can get the transcripts for a small donation on Patreon, but you are encouraged to listen to their videos and podcasts without a transcript in order to increase your listening comprehension. Español Automático has a couple of courses — in particular, Piensa y Habla en Español seems quite promising. Each unit comes with a text accompanied by an audio narration, plus vocabulary explanations, challenges, and comprehension questions. Similar to Oscar’s Point of View lessons in Unlimited Spanish, the narrators in Español Automático will summarize the text in various verb tenses in order to help these tenses become more intuitive. You can test out the first unit on their website to see more about this course.
- Flowlingo Mini-Review: Has Potential, Still Developing
flowlingo
Price:
$19.99/month
Summary
Flowlingo allows you to browse websites and news articles in your target language while providing instant audio and visual translations when you tap on unknown words. They use an SRS based flashcard system to help you remember words you don’t know, and will automatically save flashcards from words that you translate. This does mean, however, that you have less control over what is recorded in the flashcard deck, especially with the possibility of accidentally tapping on words you already know. The free content on Flowlingo’s app allows you to search the web and have access to instant translations. With a premium subscription, you can watch popular TV shows and movies, and upload your own books. The app seems to still be under development, and it is unclear whether the flashcard system only records unknown words with a premium subscription, or if the app currently has a bug. Either way, this is probably a good app to look into at a future time, but there are currently more refined apps that provide similar content. Check out Yabla to learn languages through videos or Readlang for flashcards and translations from webpages and other texts.
- Forvo Mini-Review: Audio Pronunciation of Millions of Words
Forvo
Price:
Free
Summary
Forvo’s mission is to improve spoken communication across cultures. Anyone can explore pronunciations of millions of words in over 390 languages with maps displaying where each speaker is from. The site also organizes popular categories and essential phrases for when you don’t have a specific word in mind. As a registered user, you can contribute to the site by pronouncing words or phrases in your native language or by requesting pronunciations in a specific language. You are also encouraged to vote on audio files in your native language to help others identify the best pronunciation. For those of you who enjoy using Anki, Forvo allows you to download mp3 files to use in your learning endeavours. Forvo also has an e-learning course for French, Spanish, and English; you will find three levels and a group of topics with sets of the most common words in your target language. Using an SRS flashcard system, you will be able to learn the pronunciation of these words and view an example of how to use them in a sentence. If you are looking for a pronunciation reference guide, look no further than Forvo’s extensive database!
- FSI Courses Mini-Review: Free, Comprehensive, but Also Outdated
FSI Courses
Price:
Free
Summary
The Foreign Services Institute developed their language courses to help diplomats quickly reach professional working proficiency in a language. They would attend 5 hours of language instruction per day, plus homework, for 24-88 weeks (depending on the language). The table at the bottom of this page indicates the average time it would take for a student to reach professional working proficiency. The FSI program places a strong focus on listening comprehension, in addition to extensive exercises for grammar and vocabulary. If you follow along with the audio and respond to the prompts in each drill, you will also develop confidence in speaking the language. With hundreds of pages of text, dozens of hours of audio, and several levels in many languages, the FSI courses are still probably the most comprehensive, free courses you can follow. Just remember that they are decades old, so the audio is not very clear and the vocabulary often includes both sexist and obsolete language. Also, some of the topics will not be relevant to your everyday life. Several sites host these free, open-source courses, but the site linked below is easy to navigate. Beware of any site selling courses “originally made for diplomats,” as these are probably free FSI courses with a price tag. You can also check out the DLI courses, which are equally as comprehensive (and free!).
- FunEasyLearn Mini-Review: Build Vocabulary The Fun Way
FunEasyLearn
Price:
Freemium, monthly subscriptions starting at $11.99
Summary
Not only does FunEasyLearn have a slick app interface, high-quality recordings of native speakers, and a variety of activities to reinforce your learning, but it also allows you to learn from 61 mother tongues. The lessons were developed by a team of certified linguists and acting teachers; they cover reading, listening, speaking and writing. You have the choice of learning individual vocabulary or common phrases, both of which navigate between various common categories such as “Describing people”, “General Conversation”, “ and “Transport”. Unfortunately, FunEasyLearn does not seem to provide a foundation for learning more challenging scripts, such as Chinese or Thai; luckily they have a special feature where you can choose to omit the writing aspect and see transliterations; this will allow you to focus on speaking and listening. Ultimately, FunEasyLearn is a fun and easy way to develop some basic vocabulary, but it is probably not the most effective resource for hard-core language learners; you will need to use another resource if you want to learn more than basic vocabulary words.
- Hey! Lingo Mini-Review: Has Useful Phrases
HeyLingo
Price:
$5.99/mo, $24.99/year, and $39.99/lifetime access
Summary
Hey! Lingo, with its flashy, modern, desktop interface, offers a series of phrasebook-like flashcard courses in 26 languages. Each language is divided into 50 lessons, the first 20 of which don’t require a subscription. A premium subscription will allow you to filter flashcard formats, focus on which cards have been difficult for you, and specify which cards you would like to learn in one lesson. The lessons focus on specific skills and each have 10 flashcards. They use both the official alphabet of the target language and a transliteration of the alphabet. The audio pronunciation for each card seems to use a lower quality text-to-speech program than we’ve seen in other apps, which can detract from the learning experience. Although Hey! Lingo is a phrasebook app, it does not focus on typical travel phrases, like how to order food at a restaurant. Instead, it teaches you practical phrases that get to the heart of expressing oneself. Here are some example sentences in the Korean 1 course: “I feel lonely,” “I envy him” and “Stop following me”. The lessons don’t seem to provide a solid foundation for beginners, and they probably won’t help you have conversations in your target language. However, if you enjoy learning useful phrases and already have a basic foundation of the language, Hey! Lingo could be a good option for you.
- Hotel Borbollón Mini-Review: Stories and Algorhithm-Based Assessment
Hotel Borbollón
Price:
Subscriptions start at $65/mo
Summary
Hotel Borbollon provides immersion-style Spanish education. Unlike most apps, which offer unlimited learning upon purchase, Hotel Borbollon delivers 15 minute lessons to your email, 4 times per week. During each lesson, the AI will assess and adjust your skill level based on your responses to the last 150 questions. The lessons are designed for individuals who have a basic grasp of the language, and can understand grammar explanations in Spanish without translation.The daily lessons follow a humorous storyline, in addition to providing iconic songs or movie clips relevant to Spanish culture; they emphasize listening comprehension, grammar drills, new vocabulary, comics, and culturally-relevant videos. Unfortunately, with an exorbitant price tag and limited lessons per month, it’s more economical to experience the free trial and then look for an alternative resource.*Note: This app was tested while in the Beta phase - iLanguages Mini-Review: Almost Identical to Learn 101
ilanguages
Price:
Free
Summary
Learn 101 is almost identical to iLanguages; they have the same native speaker audio files, languages, and mostly identical ‘lesson’ layouts. The main differences are that Learn 101 seems to have added some grammar explanations and reformatted a bit, while iLanguages seems to have added some extra phrases. Since every one of the languages’ “lessons” has the exact same format, including the grammar section, you will learn how to say ‘and’, ‘but’, and ‘or’, in 107 languages, but you will not learn where these types of words fit within a specific language’s sentence structure. Every page is just a list of words with a translation (and sometimes an IPA symbol transliteration). This site could be used if you want to hear native speakers pronounce basic words in very rare languages, or if you want to look up the IPA symbols of a rare language’s alphabet — otherwise, you’re probably better off making flashcards yourself on Anki or trying one of the hundreds of other resources we recommend on this site.
- iLoveLanguages Mini-Review: Another Phrasebook SIte
ilovelanguages.org
Price:
Free
Summary
iLoveLanguages seems similar to iLanguages and Learn101 in that every language has the same content and grammar. The eighteen 30-minute beginner ‘lessons’ in every language are essentially lists of phrases and vocabulary words, with audio recordings by native speakers. The site seems to provide a local teacher for each language, but for some reason, the same teacher offers at least 11 of the languages (including Gaelic, Basque, Filipino, Marathi, and Cantonese). Oddly enough, this teacher also appears in stock photos around the internet. Considering that the website advertises each language class as being taught by a native speaker, perhaps be cautious if you are considering taking a class from this site — maybe try italki or SpanishVIP for private lessons instead. iLoveLanguages may be helpful if you want to hear native speakers pronounce words in South-Eastern languages, like Marathi, Gujarati, Vietnamese, or Malay. You can compare the pronunciation with the speakers from either iLanguages or Learn 101 (but not both, as they use identical audio files). You could also check out Forvo, which is probably the most extensive pronunciation database on the internet right now.
- Instant Immersion Mini-Review: No Longer a Good Investment
Instant Immersion
Price:
1 level costs $29.95, 3 levels cost $44.95
Summary
Instant Immersion offers programs in over 120 languages, narrated by native speakers. It claims to help you build your vocabulary, converse with ease, and perfect your pronunciation. It has interactive activities on the computer, interactive games you can play with your family on a DVD, and MP3 files for your car. Their topics include food, shopping, restaurants, animals, numbers, etc. In other words, Instant Immersion will probably not help you if you are looking to have immediately applicable conversations A common trend in many reviews is the lack of structure in these courses. While other courses build on what you have previously learned and help you learn vocabulary relevant to your everyday life, Instant Immersion seems to provide a large amount of information without transitions or a clear learning path. There is a lot of content, but this doesn’t necessarily mean you will learn a lot. Instant Immersion may have been a good investment several years ago, but now there are many other options for affordable, quality language learning.
- Instituto Cervantes Mini-Review: Expensive, But Worth It
Instituto Cervantes
Price:
Freemium archives, lessons start at 20€, courses start at 75€
Summary
The Instituto Cervantes is a non-profit Spanish organization developed by the Spanish government to promote the study of Spanish language and Culture. On their website, you can find self-guided courses for levels A1 to C1. Sixteen 30-hour courses cover 48 topics, each with videos, reading material, and interactive exercises. There is a 3 month limit on access to courses, and a 3-week limit on the individual 10-hour lessons. You can also purchase an affordable 1-year membership to their library of digital content, which has thousands of books, audiobooks, databases, online dictionaries, and more for studying Spanish. Although the user interface is not very modern, the Instituto Cervantes has some of the few online platforms that meticulously takes you through each of the CEFR levels with structured, high-quality, and interactive lessons. If you know you can motivate yourself to self-study and have some spare cash to invest in your learning, it will probably be time and money well spent. Unfortunately, each course must be purchased separately and they are quite expensive. You can take a look at the archived lessons here and decide if you want to purchase the full course to provide more structure. Beginners may want to download the Readlang Chrome extension to help with translation, as most of the webpages are entirely in Spanish. Also, nothing beats learning through speaking the language, so check out italki, SpanishVIP, and Baselang for online Spanish tutors.
- Interlinear Books Mini-Review: Literal Translations Between The Lines
Interlinear Books
Price:
$9.99
Summary
Interlinear Books is a project for intermediate language learners from the creators of Cooljugator. They sell individual e-books in their original language, but with English translations between each line of text. Instead of translating full sentences that capture the spirit of the language, professional translators use literal (but understandable) translations to support you in understanding the original language’s sentence structure. Another technique that the authors use to support your learning is to highlight cognates between languages. You may find translations for words whose English counterpart looks almost identical to that of the target language, even when those English translations are not the most commonly used. The authors suggest that you don’t read the translations as full sentences, but rather that you refer to them only when you encounter words or expressions that you don’t understand. Each purchase also comes with a unilingual version for you to try out for extra practice (and sometimes they even come with an audiobook!). For intermediate learners who are tired of looking back and forth between a dictionary and their book, Interlinear may be a good intermediary to support you in the transition to unilingual books. Chinese is not supported yet, but check out Du Chinese or the Chairman’s Bao for graded reading material.
- Internet Polyglot Mini-Review: Word Lists With Games
Internet Polyglot
Price:
Free
Summary
Internet Polyglot is a website for memorizing vocabulary words in dozens of languages. It has 44 “lessons” that cover topics like cars, time, religion, politics, feelings, measurements, and more. Each lesson is essentially a word list with native speaker pronunciation, an English translation, and a link to a picture to help you remember each word. There are picture games, matching games, guessing games, and typing games, plus a word search and a slide show that reviews all of the words in the lesson. Given that none of the vocabulary words in Internet Polyglot are taught using example sentences or context, learning vocabulary using this site may not be the best use of your time. You are probably better off using Anki to curate personalized vocabulary lists and downloading native speaker audio files from Forvo to accompany your flashcards. Nevertheless, you may find it useful if all you are looking for is a site that already has lists of vocabulary words with native speaker audio. If you are looking for audio files for less commonly-studied languages in context, you can check out iLoveLanguages.
- Irakaslea Podcasts Mini Review: Improve Your Listening
Irakaslea
Price:
Free
Summary
Looking for listening comprehension activities in Spanish and Basque? Irakaslea, which means teacher in Basque, has two podcasts dedicated to this: Comprensión oral – Castellano and Ahozko ulermena – Euskera. Each channel features short, slowly spoken narratives in the target language: stories, mock news broadcasts, and more. The tone is humorous but at times cynical. Unfortunately, there aren’t any transcripts, but the text is slow enough that it’s fairly easy to identify what is being said and look it up in a dictionary. Many of the episodes are targeted at children in primary school aged roughly 5–11, and the audio quality can vary, so Spanish learners might find that they prefer other channels. For Basque learners, however, this podcast could be a useful addition to their study routine.
- iTranslate Mini-Review: 5 Apps To Support Communication
itranslate
Price:
$ 0.00
Summary
iTranslate is a dictionary, thesaurus, and phrasebook. At first glance, it seems similar to Google Translate’s free app, but a couple of extra paid features make a big difference. Like with Google Translate, you can take pictures of text in your surroundings, such as signs or newspapers, and receive instant translations into your native language. It differs in that you can also take pictures of objects in your surroundings and receive translations into your target language (although it’s not clear what the boundaries are on this function). Two people who don’t speak the same language can use iTranslate Converse as a mediator between them, translating each sentence to create a transcript on their phone (with a slight delay). You can also use the iTranslate Keyboard in any texting app to receive instant translations. To get the most out of your subscription, iTranslate includes five different apps that can support language learning and communication through text, voice, and games. Although iTranslate translates into over 100 languages, check the website to verify which languages are supported in the other apps. iTranslate seems suitable for traveling and communication in different languages. If all you need is a dictionary to support your studies, try WordReference and Linguee, or Pleco for Chinese and SpanishDict for Spanish.
- Juan Fernández Graded Readers Mini Review: Strategic
Juan Fernández Graded Readers
Price:
Kindle books range from $3.06 – $3.94
Summary
Juan Fernández used to teach Spanish at University College London and has written a series of graded Spanish readers for A1 – B2 learners. He is also the author of the podcast, Español con Juan. Unlike other graded readers, the A1 book doesn’t throw you directly into a story. Instead, it starts out with a list of basic sentences that gradually repeat with increased complexity until they turn into a story in the later chapters. Although this may seem repetitive at first, it seems like an effective way to incrementally expand and reinforce your vocabulary. This technique sets you up for success in future reading endeavours by helping you master the basics through repetition. The A2 – B2 books maintain the same level of repetition to reinforce new, level-appropriate words. You can find extra material for these books on his website here. Overall, Juan Fernández’s books are one of the few series that has a book for true A1 learners. If you have little background in Spanish, you can still follow along and gradually move onto the more advanced books in the series. Nevertheless, the graded reader series by ESLC or Read It! may be a better option for upper beginners who want something that resembles a book that you might read in your native language.
- Lang Workbooks Mini Review: Thorough Writing Practice
Lang Workbooks
Price:
$5.99
Summary
For learners of languages that use unfamiliar writing systems, the Lang Workbooks series can be a helpful and practical way to master the intricacies of writing in their target languages. Among numerous other writing systems, the series includes the Korean, Russian Cyrillic, and Armenian alphabets; Persian and Thai script; the Hindi Devanāgarī abugida; Chinese characters; and Japanese Hiragana and Katakana. The series also covers languages that use the Latin alphabet with diacritical (accent) marks, such as French, German, and Portuguese. Many books in the series have been translated into other languages, such as Italian, French, German, Spanish, and Portuguese. The series also covers writing systems that may have fewer available resources for learners, such as Lao script and the Cherokee syllabary. Each book in the series presents its featured writing system with suggested pronunciations. The practice pages in each workbook have useful features for each letter, symbol, or character, such as a recommended stroke order, font variations, example words, and a “Trace and Learn” section. Each workbook is relatively inexpensive. In addition, the publishers of the series have granted teachers and students a license to make photocopies of the workbook pages for personal use, so you can get unlimited chances to practice. Considering the depth of information in each language’s workbook, the books in this series can provide great value for learners.
- LangCorrect: Unlimited, Free Writing Practice With Feedback
LangCorrect
Price:
Free
Summary
LangCorrect is a free community-driven writing site where users can both contribute to editing others’ work and receive feedback on their own writing. After writing your piece, you may submit it to receive feedback from other site users. In order to ensure accurate feedback, multiple users can cross-check the corrections that were made and add comments. Volunteers and Patrons have access to writing in up to 10 languages, but typical users can write in a maximum of two languages at a time. Everyone is encouraged to both write and correct others’ work on the site. If you are looking to improve your writing skills in one of the over 100 languages available, trying out this resource is a must! However, if you’re studying a less common language and not finding many users to give you corrections, consider trying the exercise section in italki’s community features.
The rating is our best guess, but we haven’t yet had the opportunity to fully test and review this resource.
- Langu Mini Review: A Quality-Focused italki Alternative
Langu
Price:
Classes start at $10.50, some teachers offer a free trial
Summary
Langu is an italki competitor with some compelling factors in its favor. Just like with italki, you search its online database of teachers to book private lessons with them at times of your choosing. You can read other students’ reviews and take trial classes. Unlike italki, there are no booking fees and you can purchase in a range of currencies, including euros and British pounds. Langu also boasts its own intuitive, web-hosted classroom software, meaning you don’t have to download a program or give your teacher your contact details. This also means that all shared links, videos, and worksheets are stored on Langu. The biggest downside to Langu, in comparison with italki, is that you’ll have a smaller choice of teachers and there are no community features (forum, exercise tools, etc.). The classes also tend to be slightly more expensive. On the other hand, Langu claims that all its teachers are “top teachers” – they have to submit a video application and be approved before joining the website – and offers to give students personal recommendations for specific teachers via email, if needed. While we’ve taken classes with one Langu teacher and were impressed by the quality of the classes, we can’t comment on whether all Langu’s teachers meet the same standards.
- Language Learning WIth Netflix Mini-Review: Easy to Use
Language learning with Netflix
Price:
Freemium, Free Trial, $4.95/mo
Summary
If you want to make language learning more accessible while watching Netflix, this chrome extension is for you. The free version allows you to skip subtitles forward and backward in case you didn’t catch what was said, and you can also choose to automatically pause the movie or show after each subtitle. The full transcript is also displayed on the side. By hovering over a word you can see a short translation and hear an audio pronunciation, or you can click on the word for more context and further links to various dictionary sites. With a Pro membership you can save words or phrases, receive translations that are closer to the meaning in the original language, and create subtitles for dubbed movies. LLN’s catalogue can help you find Netflix movies or shows with high-quality subtitles to improve your experience,
- Learn WIth Oliver Mini-Review: Simple With Lots of Content
Learn with Oliver
Price:
Free Trial, with premium plans starting at $96/year
Summary
Learn With Oliver is a simple website that offers SRS flashcards with audio recordings by native speakers, random videos and articles with a list of keywords, choose your own adventure stories, writing practice with corrections by native speakers, and progress tests. The flashcard words and sentences seem to have been randomly chosen rather than curated to specific learning goals, so they are probably better used as enrichment than as a primary learning tool. The site as a whole is probably best for learners who already have a good grasp of basic vocabulary in their target language. The mixed exercises use spaced repetition to first introduce you to new words, then get you practicing through various word order, fill-in-the-blanks, listening, writing, and multiple-choice activities. Each “card” (more like “page”) allows you to see an overview of each word with example sentences. A cute perk you will receive after completing each day’s lesson is a “reward link,” which is typically a cute or funny picture on Reddit. If you’re looking for alternatives to some of the features on this site, LangCorrect may have a larger community of language learners to support you in improving your writing, Readlang and the Zhongwen Chrome Extension will help translate words on most websites, Yabla will teach you languages through video clips, and sites like Readle (German) and Du Chinese can help with your reading comprehension.
- Learn101 Mini-Review: A Re-Formatted Version of iLanguages
learn101
Price:
Free
Summary
Learn 101 is almost identical to iLanguages, but neither of them seem to be very helpful; they have the same native speaker audio files, languages, and mostly identical ‘lesson’ layouts. The main differences are that Learn 101 seems to have added some grammar explanations and reformatted a bit, while iLanguages seems to have added some extra phrases. Since every one of the languages’ “lessons” has the same format, including the grammar section, you will learn how to say ‘and’, ‘but’, and ‘or’, in 107 languages, but you will not learn where these types of words fit within a specific language’s sentence structure. Although there are examples of various grammatical structures, the explanations for these structures are also identical for every language, which, practically speaking, doesn’t seem plausible. This site could be useful if you want to hear native speakers pronounce basic words in less-common languages, or if you want to look up the IPA symbols of a less-common language’s alphabet — otherwise, you’re probably better off making flashcards yourself on Anki, or trying one of the hundreds of other resources we recommend on this site.
- Learning Spanish Like Crazy Mini-Review: Use Audible Instead
Learning spanish like crazy
Price:
Audiobooks cost between $5.99 and $29.99, or 1 Audible Credit
Summary
Learning Spanish Like Crazy is an audiobook series on Audible, created in collaboration with Spanish teachers from Latin America. It emphasizes learning to communicate confidently with native Spanish speaking friends, customers, or neighbours, as opposed to focusing on how to order fish in a restaurant or book a hotel room for a family vacation. There are brief grammar explanations followed by extensive speaking practice — you will find that you get to practice speaking almost as much as the narrators.Each lesson has a specific grammar goal. The narrators will take a grammar structure and help you practice it from different points of view and with different vocabulary words. For example, you may be asked to translate, “I asked him to not wrinkle his tie” then “I begged him not to wrinkle his tie”. Or, “Did you ask them to unplug the iron?” then, “did they ask him to unplug the toaster?”. Although this may seem repetitive, you will most likely become confident in creating your own sentences quite quickly.Although the branding is outdated, Learning Spanish Like Crazy seems like an excellent introduction for Spanish learners. It may move a bit fast for some, but you can check out a free sample of the first lesson on Audible to see if it suits your learning style. Some alternative options are Pimsleur, Paul Noble or Language Transfer (free). - Lexilogos Mini-Review: A Resource Bank For Dictionaries and Books
lexilogos
Price:
Free
Summary
Although Lexilogos seems to have entirely neglected its aesthetics, it holds more than meets the eye. If you click on one of the 130+ languages listed at the bottom of the page, you will find a series of resources to support your studies. This is especially useful for less-studied languages, like Marathi, Basque, and Pashto. Although the lists don’t provide recommendations for applications, they do provide a list of dictionaries, keyboards, news sites, books, and research papers. Additionally, if you switch to the French version of the site, there are even more languages and resources available for you to explore. Within each language’s page, there is also a dictionary search function. You will notice that more commonly studied languages will have dozens of dictionaries to choose from, while less commonly studied languages may only have one or two. Overall, Lexilogos is a great option for finding resources for less commonly studied languages. They regularly update their site, so make sure to check back if you don’t find what you’re looking for the first time around.
- Lingo Mastery Conversational Dialogues Mini Review: Dual-text
Lingo Mastery Conversational Dialogues
Price:
Kindle books cost $4.60
Summary
Lingo Mastery provides over 100 short dialogues in a series of advanced beginner books (about A2 on the CEFR scale) for various languages. Lingo Mastery’s Conversational Dialogues doesn’t take the immersive approach that you will find in other graded readers. Instead, they provide a full English translation of each text. There are no vocabulary lists or comprehension questions like in their Short Stories series, but you will read conversations that take place in over a hundred different scenarios. If your goal is to accumulate vocabulary based on situations that you may encounter in your everyday life, then Lingo Mastery is probably a good investment. If you want to follow real-life conversations that are part of a continuous story, you may want to check out Olly Richards’ 101 Conversations. Also, if you are looking for a series of books that will keep you captivated, Mandarin Companion and ESLC provide graded readers that simplify famous stories into Chinese and Spanish. If you do decide to invest in these readers, make sure to buy the Kindle version, which is about 20% of the paperback price. There are also previews available on Amazon.
- Lingo Mastery Short Stories Mini-Review: Lots of Unique Words
Lingo Mastery Short Stories
Price:
Kindle Books cost $4.60
Summary
Lingo Mastery provides 20 short stories in a series of advanced beginner books (about A2 on the CEFR scale) for various languages. Each book has a vocabulary list, reading comprehension questions, and a summary in both English and the target language. If your primary goal is to acquire new vocabulary, then Lingo Mastery’s Short Story series may be helpful to increase your skills. Each chapter has a specific language focus, such as directions, verbs, nouns, or activities. These stories have a considerable number of unique words, so you may find yourself referring to the vocabulary list more frequently than in other graded readers. Keep in mind that the stories are not as engaging as a novel you might read in your native tongue, but the repetition is helpful to familiarize you with different concepts. Other graded readers, like those by Olly Richards, ESLC, and Mandarin Companion follow a single storyline — each chapter in Lingo Mastery, however, follows a separate storyline. Therefore, although the chapters are a manageable length, finishing one may not make you eager to move onto the next. If you do decide to invest in these readers, make sure to buy the Kindle version, which is about 20% of the paperback price.
- Lingo Pie Mini-Review: Sourced From Actual TV Shows
Lingopie
Price:
$12/month
Summary
Lingo Pie is available in Spanish and Russian, with more languages to come in the future. Each language has it’s own Netflix-like platform, with shows added weekly and sourced from actual TV shows in your target language. In each of the videos, you have the option of changing its speed, using subtitles in your target language or English (or both), clicking on the subtitles to get translations, and skipping back to the previous subtitle in case you didn’t catch it. You can create your own set of SRS flashcards by clicking on unknown words, and in the review sessions your words will come with a sentence for context. It may be difficult for total beginners to get introduced to a new language through Lingo Pie, but intermediate to advanced learners may enjoy it. Unfortunately, there are no filters to help you sort through the available shows. Language Learning With Netflix provides similar features if you already have a Netflix account, and Yabla may be a more suitable platform for those who want shorter videos and more interactive learning.
- LingoHackers Mini-Review: Lots of Potential, Help It Grow!
LingoHackers
Price:
Free
Summary
LingoHackers is a community centred site that helps language learners develop their writing skills. It is managed by a small group of volunteers who are passionate about language learning. Although it is relatively new and still in the development phase, joining the community can help it grow! You can choose to respond to a series of challenges and then receive feedback from others who are both learning that language and who are native speakers. A ‘challenge’ consists of responding to prompts, such as describing a photo, creating a story with 3 random nouns, conjugating irregular verbs, or writing in a daily journal. You can set personal goals for how many challenges you want to complete per week, and you are highly encouraged to provide feedback to others’ writing. By completing goals and contributing to the community, you can gain ‘reputation points,’ which allow you to create your own thread on the community forum. As the community is quite small at the moment, you will probably be more likely to connect with others on the site. If you want to be part of a growing community and contribute to the development of the site, you can join LingoHackers for free. However, if you are looking for a similar resource with a larger community, check out LangCorrect.
- LingoHut Mini-Review: Good Intentions, So-So Follow Through
lingohut
Price:
Free
Summary
Kendal and Philipp, the creators of the LingoHut, are passionate about teaching languages. Their website supposedly helps A1 and A2 language learners develop their confidence in listening and pronunciation. All audio clips were recorded by native speakers so that beginners can get accustomed to natural pronunciation, and each lesson has a series of matching games for listening comprehension and reading. Unfortunately, the creators’ genuine intention to support beginners doesn’t seem to translate into their lessons. The lessons are essentially a series of phrases that are not adapted to each language’s culture; each of the 50 languages use the exact same set of sentences and lesson formats. This means that you will learn how to say ‘dumpling’ both in Chinese and Italian. There is also no section to learn the script of languages such as Korean, Hindi, or Arabic, nor are there transliterations to help beginners sound out the pronunciation. Furthermore, some sentences switch between formal and informal language without explanation, which would not be intuitive for an A1 learner. If you want a free resource to listen to native speakers’ pronunciation of hundreds of common phrases, LingoHut is definitely a free option. However, there are other resources that can help you learn languages more effectively.
- Lingolia Mini-Review: Clear Grammar Explanations
Lingolia
Price:
10.49€/quarter, 20.99€/half-year, 41.99€/year
Summary
Lingolia is a reference site that supports you in understanding grammar, vocabulary, spelling, and punctuation for school or work; it can be used as a tool to support your language studies when you require clearer explanations of these concepts. English and German are currently the only languages that contain additional sections on vocabulary with listening and reading exercises, although it’s possible that the Spanish and French sections will develop these in the future. Each page provides a simple explanation of your chosen topic, and then an exercise (or more if you get the premium plan) to practice your comprehension. The best part about the exercises is that they give you immediate feedback about whether or not your response was correct, providing you with the opportunity to reflect on your mistake and correct it. If you don’t want to invest in a premium plan, you can use Lingolia’s free exercises and then check out other resources that provide similar exercises for free, such as SpanishDict or Conjuguemos. Unfortunately, there is no audio on the site to train pronunciation, but Lingolia does seem to fulfill its mission of providing simple explanations to support your learning.
- Lingua Boost Mini-Review: Use Pimsleur Instead
Lingua Boost
Price:
1 level costs $19.90, two levels cost $33.90
Summary
Lingua Boost’s website sells downloadable volumes of phrasebook-like lessons that teach everyday phrases in context. The lessons are about 10 minutes long; they are narrated by native speakers and focus on vocabulary within a specific topic. Although each lesson seems to contain something that resembles a dialogue, every phrase is spoken by the same person. Additionally, many of the lessons initially appear to be dialogues, but end up as a list of sentences. For example, the first line of a lesson might be, “what do you like to do?” followed by a series of statements such as “I like to read books,” or “I like to go swimming.” Furthermore, for languages that have more difficult pronunciation, such as Russian and Hindi, the lessons do not break down pronunciation. In Pimsleur, for example, they use an excellent technique of working backwards with each syllable in a word. In Lingua Boost, it seems that you are expected to just listen and gradually catch on, even from the absolute beginner level. Finally, each volume must be purchased separately, but you can test out the first 5 lessons for free on their website. If you’re looking for a similar course that breaks down pronunciation, has interactive activities and helps you learn full dialogues in context, check out Pimsleur’s subscription plan.
- Lingua Mini-Review: Free Listening, Reading, and Writing Practice
Lingua
Price:
Free
Summary
Lingua is a free resource that offers reading, listening, dictation, and vocabulary activities. Every day, the site provides six new dictations in your target language. You can listen to two separate native speakers reading a series of sentences first at a normal speed, and then a slower speed. After you have finished transcribing, the website will automatically check and correct your writing. There are also short readings and listening comprehension exercises accompanied by a reading comprehension quiz on the side. The difficulty of content available depends on the language. Each exercise focuses on a theme relevant to everyday life, such as family, travel, and activities. Although each reading piece seems to have been written by native speakers, you may catch a few grammatical errors within the texts. You can choose to quiz either your passive or active vocabulary with a flashcard-like activity, although you may want to make personalized flashcards on Anki or use pre-made decks on Brainscape for a more curated practice. It’s probably possible to get through most of Lingua’s content in a month, as there are only a handful of exercises in each language. Nevertheless, it’s a solid supplementary resource for reading, listening, and dictation practice. If you study French or German, TV5 Monde and Deutsche Welle are sites that have similar, more extensive free content.
- Linguee Mini-Review: Best Dictionary for Formal Language
Linguee
Price:
Free
Summary
Linguee was developed by over 400 lexicographers. It is unique in that it does not use machine-translation to provide examples of words in context — instead, it sources words from articles and research papers in the original language. As a result, it is an excellent dictionary app to find translations for specialized terminology. You will learn the subtleties of various translations by reading paired paragraphs of text that have each been professionally translated, not translated by a machine. In some languages, you can listen to pronunciations by native speakers and read multiple translations of your chosen word or phrase. Although translations are highlighted in each paragraph so you can compare how to use them in each language, they can be difficult to navigate quickly. If you are looking for a website with simple and professional translations, you can check out WordReference for several different languages. SpanishDict is also an excellent option for Spanish, and Pleco is the only dictionary you will ever need for Chinese.
- Lirica Mini-Review: Grammar and Vocabulary Through Songs
Lirica
Price:
Free trial, $8.49/mo, $19.99/quarter, $24.99/year
Summary
Lirica is a paid app that focuses on listening comprehension, vocabulary, and grammar through songs in Spanish, German, and English. It also elaborates on important common phrases, explains colloquialisms, and provides interesting facts about the target language. Each song is assigned either Beginner 1, Beginner 2, or Intermediate, in addition to a specific learning goal, such as “Making affirmative sentences negative” or “expressing misunderstanding”. It’s surprisingly effective at supporting comprehension and memorization of various songs. Lirica continually expands its song library, with new songs added weekly, so a yearly subscription may be worth your time. Also, by purchasing the app you continue to support the artists, as Lirica has entered licensing agreements with each label. Check out their 7 day free trial! If you are looking for a free version that does not provide any vocabulary or grammar explanations, check out Lyrics Training.
- Loecsen Mini-Review: Phrasebook App For Absolute Beginners
Loecsen
Price:
Free
Summary
Loecsen’s strengths are its attractive interface and drawings that accompany the content. It also uses high-quality audio recordings by native speakers, even in the less-common languages. The website offers 41 different languages, but unfortunately, there are only about 432 phrases to learn, which will not take you beyond even the absolute basics. These phrases are practical, however, so in a pinch, they may save you abroad. Despite the attractive interface, the buttons are not very intuitive, so you may have to click around to figure out what each one does. Below the main interactive program, you can see a list of vocabulary and a progress bar for speaking and vocabulary activities — the vocabulary highlights in green as you complete the quizzes. At the very bottom of the page, you can also see an overview of basic pronunciation. For pronunciation practice, the read-aloud tool provides you with a series of songs or text excerpts that you can record yourself reading aloud and then compare with the original song (or a robot voice). If you’re just looking to learn basic essential phrases and pick up some vocabulary for a trip, Loecsen is an attractive program for the very casual learner. Otherwise, many other resources can take you to at least the intermediate level in most of the same languages.
- LyricsTraining Mini-Review: Listening Practice Through Songs
LyricsTraining
Price:
Free
Summary
Lyrics training is a free app that claims to improve your ability to recognize the different sounds in your target language. Through listening to different songs, you can reinforce vocabulary, expressions, and grammar concepts. Although it does not provide any translations or explanations for these skills, it does seem to train listening comprehension and memorization. While listening to your chosen song, you will be provided with a choice of 4 words to help fill in an increasing percentage of lyrics; by the advanced level, you will be responsible for filling in 100% of the lyrics. Each of the 14 languages available seem to have a wide variety of song choices, and even if you don’t understand what the lyrics mean, you will probably be able to sing along. If you would prefer an app that focuses more on comprehension, vocabulary, and grammar, check out Lirica.
- Magic Lingua Mini-Review: Pricey But Potentially Worth It
magic lingua
Price:
Courses cost between $31.99 and $499.99
Summary
Magic Lingua provides a series of individual courses for language learning. They advertise that you will gain enough confidence in speaking that you will be able to not only start a conversation with anyone, but do so without thinking about grammar and vocabulary. The full courses are offered for beginner, intermediate, and advanced speakers depending on the language (advanced is considered the B1 level). The voice-recognition software seems to do an adequate job of recognizing which words you are pronouncing correctly, and it does appear to help improve speaking abilities by actively reenacting dialogues with you. Therefore, the app alone may help develop your confidence to start conversations in your target language. Although not subscription based, each full course must be purchased individually. The 2-3 week crash courses seem more reasonable for the price, but the full 10 week courses are a hefty $200+. They consist of 10 modules plus hundreds of video lessons and speaking exercises. There is the option to complete the modules with live tutor sessions, or alone. Magic Lingua is probably worth your time if you don’t mind spending a lot on one app, but with the current price it might be better to look for alternatives. There are some free lessons available on their website for you to test out, but check back for more languages and levels in the future.
- María Danader Graded Readers Mini-Review: Useful New Words
María Danader Graded Readers
Price:
Kindle books range from $2.95 – $3.02
Summary
María Danader’s graded Spanish readers are based on everyday dialogues and expressions. Each book has accompanying audio recorded by native Spanish speakers, a chapter summary in English and Spanish, vocabulary lists, grammar notes, and reading comprehension exercises. Unlike in Paco Ardit’s books, whose vocabulary use at the C2 level feels more appropriate for B1 and B2 learners, María Danade’s vocabulary words become more specialized as the levels progress — you will see words that you may not have considered learning, such as ‘baldosa’ and ‘trastienda’. The storylines may not be as complex as in Read It! And ESLC’s series, but they all involve a mystery that will probably engage you long enough to increase your comprehension and reinforce your current vocabulary. Overall, María Danader’s readers seem like a good investment for your Spanish reading journey.
- Master Any Language Mini-Review: No Words To Describe the Nope
Master Any Language
Price:
Free
Summary
Master Any Language has a counterintuitive interface with activities that are frustrating to navigate. Its only perk is that it supports less-studied languages, but even if you do find yourself lacking resources in your target language, this website will probably detract from your learning. You will jump through hoops trying to find the audio recordings by native speakers, so you may want to try ilovelanguages or Learn101 instead; they have low ratings, but they won’t make you lose your motivation to learn altogether. Most of the activities on Master Any Language are matching games that require you to click on two identical characters, words, or letters: the purpose of this is unclear because it tests neither recall nor recognition. Another activity asks you to form or match nonsensical sequences of words (Ex. Find the sentence identical to “el el el el tchèque tchèque tchèque el el tchèque tchèque”….). Ultimately, you would probably be better off trying to decipher a page of text with absolutely no guidance than to even attempt to wrap your head around MAL’s activities.
- Mi Vida Loca Mini-Review: An Interactive Mystery For Beginners
Mi Vida Loca
Price:
Free
Summary
Mi Vida Loca is an exciting 2009 BBC video course set in Spain. It takes you through 22 interactive 10-minute episodes, with everything filmed from a first-person point of view — this makes you, the viewer, a character in the mystery. Unlike the video course Destinos, which is almost a Spanish immersion experience, Mi Vida Loca includes a human phrasebook that will interrupt to ask you questions in English and introduce keywords. Absolute beginners should feel a little more comfortable speaking Spanish if they actively participate in this series. Additionally, if you are about to go on a trip to a Spanish-Speaking country, these videos would help you to pick up basic phrases. The videos on the BBC site have been archived and are no longer updated, so if you have trouble accessing them, there are several uploads on YouTube. You can combine the syllabus and printouts from the BBC website with the videos you find elsewhere. Unfortunately, the printouts don’t include recall activities, but they provide an overview of key vocabulary and grammar points. To retain more of the information, practice the vocabulary words and grammar through activities or flashcards on SpanishDict. If you want a semi-vintage but comprehensive free Spanish course experience, try Mi Vida Loca, then dive into Destinos.
- MOSAlingua Mini-Review: Memorize Phrases and Words
Mosalingua
Price:
Freemium, App costs $6.99
Summary
MOSAlingua is an SRS flashcard app that provides useful phrases beyond the typical travel sayings you will find in other phrasebook apps. However, you will need need to use other resources if you are hoping to achieve fluency. After choosing your level or taking a placement test, you can learn through their bank of pre-made lessons and dialogues, or choose which flashcards you would like to focus on. As you progress, bonus lessons such as proverbs, quotes, jokes, and fun facts can inspire you to achieve more in your learning. To better understand new phrases, the app links to WordReference, Tatoeba, Twitter, and Google pronunciation to give you more context. If ever you are on the road and can’t look at a screen, hands-free mode will help you learn new phrases or review old ones by focusing on listening and repeating. All the content is offline, so you don’t have to worry about data or wifi for your studies. Overall, MOSAlingua seems like a useful app for learning new words and phrases. Unlike most other apps, upgrading to premium from the free content is permanent, although some bonus content comes at an additional cost.
- My Language Exchange Mini-Review: Millions of Active Users
My Language Exchange
Price:
Freemium, Gold Memberships start at $6/mo
Summary
My Language Exchange has been growing since 2000. Although the website seems out of date, it still has an active community of millions of language-learners who speak almost 200 native languages (including less commonly studied languages). You can choose a pen pal by reading their bios, or there is a chat room available for you to instantly connect with a language exchange partner — note that if you create a Gold account, you can initiate chats with other users, but as a regular user, you will have to wait to be contacted. Using the Cormier Method, the website provides tools to help intermediate speakers effectively practice with other learners. It advertises a Chat Companion with lesson plans to accompany your exchange, or lesson plans developed by teachers (although the quality of these resources varies drastically). You can also find language teachers on the site, but given that the transactions take place directly between you and the teacher, you may feel safer using a 3rd party platform like italki or Verbling. Although there are outlines on how to participate in language exchanges, how these outlines are followed depends entirely on you and your partner(s). My Language Exchange will help you build connections with other learners, but it’s up to you to plan how to practice. The concepts can also be used with any language exchange platform, such as Lingbe, italki, Tandem, and Amikumu.
- Notes in Spanish Mini-Review: Engaging Listening Practice
Notes in Spanish
Price:
Freemium, Courses start at $85
Summary
The beginner episodes of Notes in Spanish may be a bit tricky for the absolute beginner, but the narrators, Ben and Maria, say that it’s normal to be a bit lost at first. They add their personality to the conversations, so even when they teach basic introductions, it is far from the dialogue you would read in a Spanish 101 textbook — you will sound natural in no time if you practice listening comprehension with this duo. There is no end to the topics that Ben and Maria can talk about in the intermediate and advanced episodes — one day you may be touring their home, the next you’ll be listening to them discuss Harry Potter. Each episode comes in bite-sized 10ish minute chunks so you can acquire some new vocabulary on the go. It’s probably not possible for beginners to use this podcast as their sole learning resource, as after 30 beginner episodes the intermediate episodes use almost no English. You may need some extra support to keep up. Ben and Maria offer the Real Spanish Control course to help you transition from beginner to intermediate, but you can also check out the podcast Unlimited Spanish to practice speaking, Duolingo to learn the basics, and SpanishVIP or iTalki for private tutoring.
- Open Learn Mini-Review: Very Specific Course Topics
Open Learn
Price:
Free
Summary
Open Learn offers an entire section dedicated to language learning, with beginner, intermediate, and advanced content for German, Spanish, and French. You will also find some basic courses for Chinese, Welsh, English, and Italian. The courses seem to emphasize understanding the culture that the language originates from, and will teach you vocabulary through specific topics (like food and drink for beginner Italian, or ‘getting around’ for beginner Spanish). This may feel a little over the top when you end up studying holiday plans for 20 hours, but at the same time, you will probably feel quite confident in your abilities by the end of the course. Most of the beginner courses, other than Chinese, German, and Welsh, seem to be for false beginners. You will probably need to develop a basic foundation of your target language (maybe a section or two of the Duolingo tree, or the introductory courses on Coursera) before diving in, unless you want a challenge. Overall, Open Learn language courses are good for improving your language skills on specific topics, but you may not feel fulfilled in the area of practical conversation. Moreover, the user interface is not as attractive or easy to navigate as other resources, like Coursera. For some other free options that may give you more practical language skills, check out Coursera, edX, Deutsche Welle (German), TV5 Monde (French), Duolingo, HelloChinese, or Language Transfer.
- OPLingo Mini Review: Community Driven, Non-Profit
OPLingo
Price:
Freemium, Premium Subscriptions cost $6.99/mo, $60/Year
Summary
OPLingo is a community-oriented, non-profit language learning site. It essentially combines the functions of LingQ, LangCorrect, Readlang, iTalki, and HelloTalk. The free version gives you limited access to some functions, but by paying for a membership you support ethical causes — such as building a primary school in Tanzania. You can browse user-contributed texts or easily import your own YouTube videos, articles, or ebooks into the Reading Tool. OPLingo has also developed hundreds of audio conversations in several languages, including Tagalog, Cebuano, Thai, Swahili, and Russian. Within each page, you can read a transcript and get definitions and pronunciations of unknown words. By identifying which words you don’t know, the next passages you read will highlight the number of known or unknown vocabulary words. In their Write & Correct section, you can write in over 100 languages and exchange corrections with other users, although Spanish, French, and English learners have a better chance of receiving corrections than other languages at the moment. You can also practice a language by texting with fellow community members, or by hiring a teacher in your target language. OPLingo has a lot of potential and is a good alternative to LingQ, but it needs a community of learners to help it grow — so check it out!
- Optilingo Mini-Review: Use if You Absolutely Love Slideshows
optilingo
Price:
$11.99/mo, $23.97/quarter, $41.94/half-year, $71.88/year
Summary
Optilingo is essentially a phrase-bank in slideshow form. Each of the 20 languages available includes 100 lessons, none of which contain information about the topic or learning goals during the writing of this review. You can expect to listen to a series of phrases, and then review (what seems like) the last 45 phrases you have learned before moving onto the next lesson. The phrases are not in flashcard form — instead, they are in a slideshow with both the English and the target language displayed together. Optilingo advertises learning and practicing with over 29 hours worth of phrases, and while you can surely practice with their phrase-bank, actually learning to speak any of the languages offered using their platform is questionable. If you are keen on language learning, check out our bank of reviews for other resources.
- Paco Ardit Graded Readers Mini-Review: Average Storylines
Paco Ardit Graded Readers
Price:
Kindle books start at $0.98
Summary
Paco Ardit has written a series of graded Spanish readers for levels A1 – C2, although the C2 level may be more appropriate for B2 learners. Until Paco’s B2 level books, the writing does not flow very smoothly. There are few conjunctions to join simple sentences together, and the sentences stop after every ten words or so, making for a bit of a bumpy read. At the B2 level, however, the flow becomes more natural. The storylines do not seem very engaging, and they often have morals that may not vibe well with every reader. If your goal is to consume lots of beginner content and expose yourself to key vocabulary words, then Paco Ardit’s books may provide a relatively inexpensive opportunity to achieve that. However, if you love to read and are keen on finding engaging storylines to accompany your language learning, A2 learners may want to try the Read It! or ESLC series.
- Paul Noble Mini-Review: Great for Beginners
Paul Noble
Price:
Complete Audiobooks start at $14.95 on Audible, or 1 Audible credit
Summary
Paul Noble’s audiobook series is for beginners or upper-beginners who want to gain confidence in their target language. There are also crash courses for those who will soon be heading off on a business trip or holiday. The series focuses on cognates (words that are similar in both English and your target language) in order to build your vocabulary more efficiently. It also seems to have been inspired by Michel Thomas’ courses (with a few improvements). Paul introduces vocabulary and gets you to make new sentences through problem solving. For example, he may introduce a sentence, then ask you to make a new sentence using your current knowledge and the new words you have just learned. Although the narrators move a bit slowly, the consistent interaction between you and the material ensures that you won’t get bored. Because Paul breaks down the rules of each language in such a simple and concise way, you can feel confident in building new sentences by yourself.
- PodcastsInSpanish Mini-Review: Bite-Sized Podcasts With Worksheets
Podcasts in Spanish
Price:
Free; extras cost €18/quarterly, €18/half-year
Summary
Podcasts In Spanish may have a bit of an outdated look, but they have a good amount of content to support intermediate to advanced learners. Each level has about ninety 3-minute episodes with accompanying downloadable mp3s, transcripts, worksheets and answers, and various vocabulary activities. The creators are especially good at identifying vocabulary that may confuse second-language learners without context (did you know that the tooth fairy in Spanish is called “Ratoncito Pérez”?), and they discuss a variety of topics relevant to everyday life. The narrators speak at the same natural speed from levels 1 to level 3, so it seems more suitable for intermediate and advanced learners despite the differentiation between elementary, intermediate, and advanced podcasts. If you are an upper-beginner looking to challenge yourself, you can try out the free samples to see if they are appropriate. Overall, Podcasts In Spanish has a lot to offer, especially with the additional worksheets, but other programs may offer a smoother transition between levels. Spanish Obsessed and Notes in Spanish both offer additional materials with three distinct levels of podcasts to improve your listening comprehension, while Unlimited Spanish is an excellent resource that will improve your oral communication. SpanishPod101 is also full of activities and podcasts that focus on vocabulary, grammar, and cultural information. For free supplementary grammar material, you can always check out SpanishDict.
- Polly Lingual Mini-Review: Phrasebook With Simple Games
Polly Lingual
Price:
Freemium, yearly subscriptions start at $2.99/mo
Summary
Polly Lingual is a phrasebook app and website with a series of basic word lists, flashcards, and memory games. Some of the phrases are pronounced by native speakers, while others use text-to-voice. Unlike other phrasebook apps that focus on phrases alone, Polly Lingual introduces the basic alphabet in languages with non-romanized scripts. You can quiz yourself on the basic vowels and consonants in Russian, Hebrew, Korean, Japanese, and Arabic. Polly Lingual may be helpful for a quick review of what you’ve already learned, but if you’re keen on learning to write a new script, you may want to check out Write It! or Write Me. There are also Polly Ambassadors — tutors who will provide short videos of language learning tips throughout the site. You can send them a personal message or hire them as a private tutor. Overall, Polly Lingual only teaches basic phrases and will probably not help you learn how to construct your own sentences. If you’re just beginning to learn another language, check out French in Action, Red Kalinka (Russian), Chinesefor.us, 90 Day Korean, Portuguese lab, or Pimsleur to get more out of your time. Also, Italki will give you more options for private tutors, if that’s what you’re looking for.
- Quizlet Mini-Review: A Flashcard/Quiz App for Many Languages
Quizlet
Price:
$ 0.00
Summary
Quizlet is a flashcard-based learning system. Community-contributed flashcards are available for numerous languages. These vary in quality, but you can preview them to see how well they meet your needs. Each set of flashcards powers other activities: In Learn mode, you demonstrate your mastery of each word or phrase by using multiple choice to select the correct definition. There are also spelling and writing exercises. The spelling exercises can be frustrating, as they sometimes require the addition of alternate word endings that are not always pronounced by the speaker. A space-themed word game and a “Concentration”-style matching game inject some extra fun into your study time. Recent changes to Quizlet mean that you are now required to sign in to use the flashcard sets. As Quizlet is now promoting two premium plans — the modestly priced “Quizlet Plus” and the less-expensive “Quizlet Go” — you may encounter several promotions for these paid versions. We have not tried the paid tier at this time. Overall, Quizlet can be a fun, effective way to learn new vocabulary. It has the tools to help with auditory comprehension and spelling in your target language. It covers many languages, even some harder-to-find ones. However, not all of the flashcard sets are high quality.
- Read it! Mini-Review: Famous Stories in Beginner Spanish
Read it!
Price:
Kindle books start at $1.26
Summary
Read It! has published a handful of graded Spanish readers for A1 and A2 learners. These readers are more advanced than the A1 and A2 readers by Paco Ardit or Juan Fernandez, so you may want to have a basic understanding of the imperfect and past perfect tense before diving in. You can be sure that Read It! has engaging storylines, as they are all simplified versions of famous novels, including Sherlock Holmes, El Quijote, Moby Dick, and Journey to the Center of the Earth. For the most part, the writing seems to flow naturally — you will probably forget that you are reading to learn Spanish as you become immersed in the story. Read It! does not have a vocabulary list or reading comprehension questions at any point during the books. If you are looking for these tools to accompany your studies, check out the Spanish books by ESLC, Olly Richards, Juan Fernandez, and María Danader. Overall, Read It! is an enjoyable series with which you can confidently begin your Spanish reading journey.
- Readlang Mini-Review: A Must-Have For Language Lovers
Readlang
Price:
Freemium, Premium subscriptions start at $5/mo
Summary
With Readlang as your Google Chrome Extension, you can have instant translations for words or sentences in over 45 languages at the tip of your mouse cursor (or fingertip)! Browse the internet and effortlessly click on unknown words to get a translation that stays on your screen until it is no longer needed. If you can’t find anything to read on the internet, you can access a bank of public texts organized by word count and difficulty, browse the most popular websites for Readlang users, or upload your own text to study. If you read on the Readlang website, you can see words that you have previously translated highlighted across every text. Readlang collects SRS flashcards for you from words that you have translated. It will only record the most useful words for you to practice based on word frequency lists, which could be either a pro or a con depending on your study goals. Each flashcard also includes audio pronunciation and the sentence from which the word was taken. You can choose to reveal the flashcard to check your comprehension, or type in your response for more effective recall. The free version provides enough for the casual user, but upgrading to an affordable premium membership allows unlimited phrase translations and unknown word highlighting across texts. Although there may be some problems with translations in beta languages, and sometimes it fails to recognize text, overall Readlang is an excellent resource for language lovers.
- Reverso Translation Mini-Review: Best for French learners
Reverso Translation
Price:
$ 0.00
Summary
Reverso is a translation and spell check app. Its features primarily target French and English learners, although it also translates into a handful of other languages. Compared with BonPatron, Reverso’s spell-check function (available only for French and English) is less attuned to general mistakes, such as capitalization or inappropriate commas. Reverso only catches some of the errors related to inappropriate accordance of genders or numbers from “The House of Être” verbs. Nevertheless, it does a decent job of catching obvious mistakes, and it will provide you with synonyms to enrich your writing. You are encouraged to use the spell check function at each stage of the writing process because when you correct one error, the program may identify new ones. The free version allows you to check 1200 characters at a time, and upgrading to a premium version will allow you to check unlimited characters. The Reverso Contexto dictionary is an excellent resource for most of the available languages. While Linguee takes examples from relatively formal sources, Reverso Contexto provides example sentences professionally translated from movies, dialogues, official documents, websites, and newspapers. Other resources include Reverso’s dictionary (which is usually from Collin’s) a verb conjugator, French and English grammar articles, a thesaurus, and a document translator.
- Simply Learn Mini-Review: Spaced Repetition Phrases For Travelers
Simply Learn
Price:
$ 9.99
Summary
In Simply Learn, by Simya Solutions, you can search for and review over 1000 phrases in over 30 categories. It takes the typical phrasebook app one step further by allowing you to add your favorite phrases to SRS flashcards. Given that its developers also developed Ling, an additional, more comprehensive resource that supports language learning, it seems that Simply Learn is a supplementary app for individuals who need to learn basic phrases for traveling abroad. The creators don’t seem to have intended for people to use this app to learn a language in its entirety, but rather to support them in memorizing basic phrases for travel. As with Simya Solutions’ other apps, Simply Learn is most helpful for less commonly learned languages, such as Hokkien and Khmer. Beginners can access the basic cards for free, but the advanced traveler will have to make a one-time purchase to access all the content. If what you truly want is to have a set of phrases under your belt, Simply Learn’s SRS flashcards and native-speaker audio can support you. However, if you are studying a less commonly learned language and want to understand the basic sentence patterns and writing system, check out Ling.
- Spanish Obsessed Mini-Review: Subscription Offers More
Spanish Obsessed
Price:
Freemium, Premium subscriptions start at $24.90/mo
Summary
Language learning podcasts often have different levels, but they usually expect you to magically advance in the space between them. Lis and Rob, on the other hand, seem to seamlessly transition from level to level. They differentiate between Spanish from scratch and beginner Spanish, and the intermediate level is a realistic step up from the beginner episodes. You can listen to their podcasts on a couple of different platforms, but listening on their website gives you the advantage of following the podcasts like a course. You can gain access to special courses with a subscription, such as those that focus on pronunciation and vocabulary. Each episode’s page has a line-by-line interactive time-stamped transcript — by clicking on the time stamp next to a line of text from the dialogue, you can jump to that sentence within the recording. You can also see a translation with notes that elaborate on the different phrases or word usage (or correct some of Rob’s speech). Unfortunately, the page does not follow along with the podcast, so you will have to manually scroll down as you listen. The advanced episodes feel more like upper-intermediate Spanish, so advanced learners may not feel as challenged. However, for the beginner to the intermediate learner, Spanish Obsessed is full of opportunities to improve your skills.
- SpanishDict Mini-Review: Doesn’t Get Better Than This
SpanishDict
Price:
Free, Premium subscriptions start at $12.99/mo
Summary
There is no online dictionary better at supporting Spanish learners (or Spanish speaking English learners) than SpanishDict. When you search for a word on the website, you will find a series of definitions, examples of how to use the word in context, conjugations, synonyms, and common phrases that include the word. For those of you who create SRS flashcards in Anki or other apps, each dictionary entry contains a relevant picture that you can save to your decks. You can add dictionary entries to their Spaced Repetition System flashcards, find quizzes and flashcards for the most common Spanish textbooks, watch video pronunciations of thousands of words, or engage in video lessons and exercises for various grammar topics. There are also extensive articles on grammar, vocabulary, tongue twisters, and language learning that contain clear explanations, audio pronunciations, and links to related articles. Both the mobile app and website are worth your attention, but the website contains significantly more features and pronunciations by native speakers. The website is free and supported by advertisements, but by subscribing to their Premium membership you can get some extra features and remove the ads.
- Spanishland School Mini-Review: Maintain Your Motivation
Spanishland
Price:
Freemium, Premium subscription: $59 – $797
Summary
Are you an intermediate or advanced leaner of Spanish looking to elevate your Spanish language skills? We have a great resource for you to check out.
Spanishland School is a language learning platform with both free and paid resources for intermediate and advanced learners. Their free content includes two different types of podcasts, YouTube videos and articles.
Spanishland’s paid option is the Parcero membership which features live classes, group calls, structured grammar courses, a private podcast, and much more. You get a comprehensive library of courses and learning material which include documentary videos, unique dialogues, worksheets and lots of other engaging content. With weekly live classes, you can interact with Andrea directly and get answers to any questions that you may have. You also get to test your learning progress with quizzes and get support from their team whenever you need. The community forum on the Parecero platform allows you to interact with other Parcero members, take part in challenges, participate in contests, and share tips. Spanishland provides an outline and structure, making it easy for you to set your own learning pace and stay motivated.
Spanishland may not be cheap and may require a lot of self-discipline and focus, but it is a great option if you’re looking for a more personalized and specific approach to help you advance your Spanish. - Speekoo Mini-Review: Dip Your Toes in a Language and Culture
Speekoo
Price:
Classes start at $15/hour
Summary
Learning with Speekoo is more of a cultural journey than an intensive language learning app. With every lesson, you will explore some tourist attractions, unusual aspects, and funny anecdotes about different cities that speak the language you are studying. With each correct answer, you “walk” a kilometre further on your journey and gradually unlock videos and articles. Unfortunately, all of these features are in English (or French if you are learning from French). Speekoo’s free lessons build on one another, and you can easily apply new words to your everyday life. Unfortunately, although you will effectively learn what the app teaches you, the extent of the material will only give you the absolute basics of each language. You will not be able to have even simple conversations once you have finished all the levels. The app also doesn’t introduce new scripts, so you won’t learn how to read Japanese or Chinese; instead, you will write the sounds using the English alphabet. Despite its simplicity, Speekoo is a fun, free option for the extremely casual learner who wants to dip their toes in a language. Hopefully, the developers will take the levels further.
- StoryLearning Olly Richards 101 Conversations Mini Review: Practical
Olly Richards 101 Conversations
Price:
Kindle books cost $0.99
Summary
Olly Richards, the creator of I Will Teach You A Language, has written a series of books for beginner and intermediate learners to improve their conversation skills in several languages. He also has a Short Stories series, but this review focuses on 101 Conversations. His 101 Conversations series has a beginner and intermediate book for every language, though both books are appropriate for level A2 on the CEFR scale. You will learn natural phrases that you can use in everyday conversation through following the story of six people. Each chapter has a dialogue between some of these characters, which you can engage with through the practical learning methods that Olly outlines at the beginning of each book. While the first chapter in the first book may have one-sentence exchanges, the characters get chattier and the grammar becomes more complex as you continue reading. Overall, Olly’s 101 Conversations series is fun to follow, particularly because each book sets out to solve a mystery. They are less expensive than his Short Stories series, but also contain less content (there are no comprehension questions or summaries at the end of the chapters, but there are short vocabulary lists). Nevertheless, both are probably a good investment to advance your conversational Spanish abilities.
- StoryLearning Olly Richards Short Stories Mini Review: Practical
Olly Richards Short Stories
Price:
Kindle books start at $6.55
Summary
Olly Richards, the creator of I Will Teach You A Language, has written a series of short stories for high-beginners to improve their reading skills in several languages. He also has a 101 Conversations series, but this review focuses on his Short Stories. Most of the languages use the most common words in your target language, with natural phrases that you would overhear locals using while conversing amongst each other. In every language, the plot follows the same characters and adventures, with some adjustments for cultural differences. The intro to each book provides a practical overview of how to maximize your learning. At the end of each chapter, you will see a summary of the plot, a vocabulary list of new words (that are also bolded in the stories), and comprehension questions. The comprehension questions are simple, allowing you to find the responses directly in the text. Overall, the Kindle version of Olly’s short stories seems worth the investment for upper beginners to improve their language abilities. If you’re learning Chinese, check out the Mandarin Companion series. Also, A1 – A2 Spanish learners can enjoy several short novels in the ESLC and Read It! series.
- Storyling Mini-Review: Simple, Quality Content
Storyling
Price:
$ 15
Summary
Storyling solves the problem of looking for reading content appropriate to your language level. Each story has been written, translated, and narrated by native speakers, and are divided into beginner, intermediate, and advanced levels. They cover a variety of topics, including stories, history, news, and trivia. You can click on each word in the story for a translation, or you can reveal a full translation of each paragraph as needed. You can also save unknown words to review in a flashcard section, although it is unclear whether the flashcards use SRS or are sorted randomly. The Spanish section already contains over 150 stories, while the other languages are still developing in the Beta phase. Compared to other products, it is a bit pricey for what is offered, but they do have a very simple, intuitive, and attractive user interface with quality content. For more reading or listening that is concentrated on current events, check out News in Slow; for more dialogue-based listening and reading, check out LanguagePod101.
- Strokes International Mini Review: Pricy but Comprehensive
Strokes International
Price:
53.00 CHF
Summary
Strokes International sells courses for 24 different languages. They’re more focused on European languages, from the popular German, Spanish, and French through to Slovakian, Czech, and Danish. They do have a couple of non-European ones, though, such as Arabic, Chinese, and Japanese. Using a Strokes International course feels a bit like going back in time. You have to download the program onto your computer (and we had to install additional software to run it). In the days of language apps and on-the-go learning, this seems a little inconvenient. Despite that, the course seems to be fairly effective. You listen to and repeat a natural conversation, before being slowly taught the words and phrases. You practice speaking them aloud, typing them, and playing Match Pairs card games. Although grammar takes a back seat, there are explanatory notes throughout and you can access a detailed grammar guide. There’s also a Pronunciation Trainer and Vocabulary Trainer. The Danish beginner course, which we briefly trialed, has 100 lessons.
- Sublearning Mini-Review: There Are Better Uses For Your Time
Sublearning
Price:
Free
Summary
Sublearning is a very simple website that supposedly helps you learn languages through movie subtitles. You will be presented with 1 to 6 lines of subtitles from your chosen movie, and then you can reveal the translation after thinking about the response. There are 62 source and target languages, which does make one wonder where the translations are coming from; be wary of Sublearning’s translation quality. Just to clarify, the subtitles do not seem to be sourced from the most iconic phrases from your favourite movies; rather, they seem to be random lines from the movie, sometimes as simple as “I don’t think so”. If you’re just looking to reminisce about anything that was said in movies you have seen, you can go to Sublearning to pass some time. However if you’re interested in language learning, I recommend checking out some of the many resource reviews we have on this site.
- SuperMemo Mini-Review: Not to Be Confused With Super-Memo
Supermemo
Price:
Free trial, $9.90/mo
Summary
*The app SuperMemo is often confused with Super-Memo SuperMemo seems to advertise its courses and their efficacy by emphasizing the SuperMemo Method. The website states that it is the only scientifically-proven computer-aided learning method — however, the method is a typical Spaced Repetition System that Brainscape, Anki, Pleco, Skritter, SpanishDict, and countless other resources use. If SuperMemo made any special improvements, they do not stand out. SuperMemo’s courses can be accessed through a monthly membership or through purchasing individual courses. Each course contains a series of flashcards with some interactive activities (such as fill-in-the-blanks, multiple-choice questions, and dropdown menus). In some beginner courses, like Hungarian and Dutch, you can learn basic pronunciation with the International Phonetic Alphabet; this can support you in both understanding and producing the sounds of the language later one. They also use native speaker pronunciation to train your ear. The Fast Track courses may have potential, but there do not seem to be many grammar explanations, and it may be up to you to understand your errors. Additionally, you may find that you are suddenly reading translations from your target language in Polish, whether or not you speak Polish. Overall, Supermemo seems okay, but there are probably other resources that will help you learn a language more effectively.
- Tatoeba Mini-Review: A Community Writing Sentences in Context
Tatoeba
Price:
Free
Summary
Tatoeba is a sentence-focused reference dictionary, not word focused. Therefore, by searching for a word in any language, you are searching for examples of that word in context. The site is community-driven, but you don’t have to be multilingual to contribute to the site — it needs native-speaking writers to expand the example database and proofread user sentences. All of the translations are interconnected: even if there is technically no direct translation from Zulu to Chinese, an English translation for the same sentences in both languages will provide direct translations between them. Although Tatoeba supports about 388 languages, about 200 of these languages have less than 100 sentences, and about 58 have less than 10. Nevertheless, the database is continuously growing, and with more community members, the less common languages may have a chance to develop further. It is prohibited to use a translation tool or copyrighted sentences to contribute to the translation database. Unfortunately, some contributors write in a language in which they are not proficiently fluent. As a result, the site has grammatical mistakes and sentences that don’t sound natural. You may have to do some digging to figure out if the contributor is a native speaker or not. Because of the potential user errors on the site, you may want to check out WordReference, Pleco, SpanishDict, Kanji Study , and Linguee to find words in context for more commonly studied languages.
- The Spanish Dude Mini-Review: Not For Learning Pronunciation
The Spanish Dude
Price:
Free, courses start at $27
Summary
Many YouTube language teachers speak conversationally with their audience, but Jordan, The Spanish Dude, seems to speak in the same style that you might observe at a slam poetry night. One thing to note is that Jordan mostly pronounces Spanish words using English pronunciation and intonation. He has explicitly emphasized that you do not need to learn good Spanish pronunciation to be understood, but that’s a subjective opinion. Jordan teaches Spanish from an English-speaker’s point of view, which can be helpful for new language learners. His content seems primarily for beginners — he breaks grammar down into manageable chunks so you won’t get overwhelmed with the seemingly endless types of Spanish conjugations. Jordan has many free YouTube videos, a couple of conjugation courses, and a travel crash course — but Logical Spanish is his most comprehensive course. Here, Jordan not only gives you a comprehensive overview of Spanish grammar, but he also teaches English grammar to explain how language is structured. You can check out his videos if you would prefer to focus on the content of your communication rather than the way you deliver it, but make sure to support your learning by listening to native speakers. Paul Noble, Pimsleur, Unlimited Spanish, Espanol Automatico, Destinos, and Spanish Obsessed are just a few of the many resources that teach native Spanish pronunciation.
- Unlimited Spanish Mini-Review: Learn Grammar Intuitively
Unlimited Spanish
Price:
$ 0.00
Summary
On his website, Oscar, the founder of Unlimited Spanish, provides hundreds of downloadable podcasts with free, well organized transcripts. The podcasts provide an introduction to his teaching method and are separate from his four purchasable courses. Oscar avoids the traditional textbook methods of learning Spanish and helps his students learn to think in the language. His episodes include short stories with accompanying exercises for you to respond to while you listen. Although he speaks slightly slower than a natural speed, he still introduces vocabulary that would be new even to the upper-intermediate learner. If you have no background in Spanish, his 30 day course will help you learn the foundation of spoken Spanish from scratch and teach you grammar intuitively rather than through drilling exercises. He also has courses for intermediate learners to improve fluency, and a new course for those struggling with verb tenses. Many of the courses include Point of View Lessons that help make grammar more intuitive; these lessons tell the same story in different tenses or from different perspectives Judging by the quality of his podcasts, it seems like the courses would be a solid investment to improve your Spanish. Listen to a couple (or couple hundred) free episodes to see if it suits your learning style!
- Verbix Mini-Review: Adequate for Less-Studied Languages
Verbix
Price:
Free
Summary
Verbix is a verb conjugator website and app developed by an independent non-profit organization. It conjugates over 100 languages, including Old English, Latin, and Yiddish The amount of information on the conjugation page varies depending on how common the language is. At its best, it will display nominal forms, most common verb conjugations, verbs that have similar conjugations, translations, synonyms, antonyms, cognates, and a section on etymology. Sometimes there are sample sentences (without translations) that seem to come from articles and books. The final section on additional information seems a bit random, and its purpose is unclear. To conjugate a verb in another language, you have to know the verb in its infinitive form. Unfortunately, although Verbix has a translation function, it doesn’t seem to cover all of the available languages, so you may not be able to find the verb you are looking for in the first place. A fun page to explore is Verbix’s list of over 6000 languages with a map depicting where each of these languages is spoken. Otherwise, Verbix seems a bit random and incomplete. It may be a helpful resource for less commonly studied languages, but check out Reverso Translation, Cooljugator, and SpanishDict first. Also, if you want to practice verb conjugations in Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, or Latin, check out Conjuguemos
- VerbSquirt Mini-Review: Use Conjuguemos for Free Instead
VerbSquirt
Price:
Freemium, $0.99
Summary
VerbSquirt is a conjugation app for mobile devices that uses multiple choice questions and matching activities to test your knowledge. You can learn by verb group, verb tense, or build your own custom exercises. It also has a summary page that allows you to see how many points you score on average per day, week, and month.The app doesn’t have a very attractive interface compared to other resources, but if you want to tap on answers to practice recognition rather than active recall, VerbSquirt may be a good option for you. However, you may want to use Conjuguemos instead — it provides free exercises that require you to use active recall and type out the answers. You can also try SpanishDict or Ella Verbs if you are learning Spanish. - Vocabulearn Mini Review: Unlikely to Teach You a Language
Vocabulearn
Price:
$29.99 on Amazon, free on Spotify
Summary
Vocabulearn has so-called audio courses for numerous languages on Amazon and Spotify. We don’t believe you’ll learn much from them, but they could help you practice your pronunciation. For this mini review, we tried out the Vocabulearn Swahili/English Level 1 course. It’s split into four CDs, each with its own theme, and then each theme is divided into four lessons. The themes are: Nouns; Adjectives, Adverbs, Prepositions, Conjunctions 1; Expressions; Verbs. In each track, we listened to long lists of words and phrases. First, it was said in English; secondly, it was said in Swahili. However, there were no grammar or contextual explanations, drills, or activities to help you remember the material. In short, we’re not convinced that you’d be able to make your own sentences or even remember the vocabulary after listening to these CDs. However, if you’re studying a language with fewer resources, we think you could use it to practice your pronunciation by repeating each word after the speakers say it.
- Vocly Mini-Review: Expand Your Vocabulary in Less Common Languages
Vocly
Price:
$ 11.99
Summary
Vocly is a vocabulary learning app that uses a couple of different techniques to reinforce new words (although it’s unclear whether or not the app uses an SRS system). Each word comes with audio pronunciation by native speakers and a toggle to either reveal or hide the romanization of the word. As with most of Simya Solution’s apps, Vocly is best for languages with fewer available resources. Instead of using English translations in the flashcard activities, the app will prompt you to associate the new word with a small picture. On one hand, this will help you make fewer translations into your native language. On the other hand, the pictures can be ambiguous and you may forget what they symbolize. The flashcard activities include matching activities, identifying new words that fit under a specific category, matching the sound of a word to an image, and asking you to spell the word in the language’s script. Unfortunately, the free version only allows 7 minutes of learning per day, which can feel rushed. Ling is a more comprehensive option for learning multiple facets of a language, but if your goal is to expand your vocabulary, Vocly has over 1600 words. The paid version is quite expensive for what it offers compared to other resources, but for less common languages it is a fun and interactive option.
- Wlingua Mini-Review: A Clear Learning Path
wlingua
Price:
Freemium, $10.99/mo, $21.99/quarter, $64.99/year
Summary
Wlingua relies on two methodologies for learner success: staggered repetition and progressive exposure. Staggered repetition seems identical to typical spaced repetition methods, while progressive exposure ensures that all new words and concepts are based on what you have previously learned. This ensures that there are no gaps in knowledge when it comes to tackling more advanced lessons. Additionally, each lesson focuses on one concept at a time in order to avoid overwhelming the learner, and there is a clear path for what you will be learning from beginner to the end. Each new word is “linked to its precise meaning or use” so that you can use them in context. The program consists of new vocabulary, grammar, exercises, reading practice, and audio by native speakers with different accents. The downside is that there seems to be more focus on reading and comprehension than on listening and speaking. Only Spanish and Russian are currently available from Beginner to Upper-Intermediate. Other languages are available at the beginner and elementary levels. You can use the app without registering for an unspecified number of days. There is limited basic content available for free, while the premium plan offers unlimited access, practice reviews tailored to your learning, and downloadable PDF lessons.
- Wordbit Mini-Review: Innovative Flashcards for Short Term Use
WordBit
Price:
Free
Summary
WordBit is a free app that minimizes the effort and thought that goes into deliberate practice by presenting you with the opportunity to practice each time you open your lock screen. Each time you open your phone, the app will overlay the lock screen and present you with either multiple choice translations for a given word, or a flashcard. You can choose to close the app to access the lock screen, or respond to the prompt. Although this app interferes with tasks on your phone that require immediate attention, it is no doubt effective at consistently exposing you to new vocabulary. It is available in multiple languages, for both target and source languages, and there is a large vocabulary category bank to choose from, including vocabulary from each of the levels A1-C2. There are some bugs in its programming, such as restarting your progress through each deck if you add or remove a category, and the ads at the bottom of the screen are easily tapped by accident.
- WordReference Mini-Review: Thorough and Professionally Translated
Wordreference
Price:
Free
Summary
WordReference is one of the best websites for single-word translations. It uses a combination of its own dictionaries and Collins’, depending on the language, and relies on professional translations rather than machine-translations. With each word you look up, you will receive multiple examples of how to use it, nuances of each meaning, and a list of how to incorporate it into multiple phrases. Whereas sites like Bab.la seem to have machine-translated examples that sound quite random at times, WordReference’s examples can be applied directly to your everyday conversation. You can also find conjugation tables and the Collins COBUILD English Usage dictionary, which shows you how to use individual English words correctly — through its explanations, English learners will be able to differentiate between words that are easily confused (such as ‘current’ and ‘currant’). If the explanations don’t make sense, you can ask questions in the WordReference Language Forum — there you will find an active community of language learners discussing language learning topics. Unfortunately, not all words have audio pronunciation, but those that do can be played back at different speeds and with different accents (depending on the language). Although WordReference is a thorough resource, SpanishDict is probably a better option for Spanish learners, and Pleco is the only dictionary you will ever need for Chinese. Linguee is also similar to WordReference but specializes in formal language, and Forvo has millions of words pronounced by native speakers in hundreds of languages.
- YouGlish Mini-Review: Thousands of Words in Context From YouTube
YouGlish
Price:
Free
Summary
YouGlish is a website that has indexed millions of video clips to put words in context for language learners. After searching for a word in your target language, you will see a YouTube video with subtitles and your target word highlighted in yellow. When you have heard the word, you can continue listening to the video or move on to the next example. You can also slow down the speed of the audio, click on a sentence in the transcript to replay it, or skip backwards 5 seconds to listen again. Sometimes you can watch over 1000 videos with your target word, other times there may only be a couple dozen available. Some languages also allow you to choose between different regional dialects, such as: French from Canada or France; Chinese from Taiwan or China; and Spanish from Spain or Latin America. You will need to search for the word in your target language, so you can check out WordReference or Linguee to get a translation. Forvo also provides audio clips of native speaker pronunciation, but with YouGlish, you can practice listening to these words in context. If you want help with reading the subtitles, you can download Readlang for on-screen translations. The Zhongwen Chrome extension will be better for Chinese learners, as it provides the pronunciation of each character as well as a definition.