The best app to learn Spanish might not be obvious from searching through the copious options in the Apple or Android app stores. Not only can the number of Spanish apps be overwhelming, but the apparent quality of a lot of these apps can be discouraging.
Luckily, there are actually a lot of excellent apps for learning Spanish out there. They can teach you nearly every aspect of the language. However, you might not be able to tell that from a quick scroll through the app store.
A single app that satisfies all of your Spanish learning wishes may not exist, no matter how hard you look. You can mix and match a couple of different apps. That’s why I’ve organized the Spanish learning apps below according to their particular strengths.
For example, you might want to use the Best App for Learning on the Go during a long commute to work, and the Best Immersive 1-1 Spanish Learning Experience to turbo-charge your progress at home.
A lot of the best apps have multiple strengths. To minimize repetition, I put them under only one or two categories that make the most sense.
Some of us seek the best learning experience possible, and money is not a dominating factor. Most of this post is devoted to such apps. For the best and worst Spanish learning apps – Pimsleur, Baselang, Ouino, Rocket Spanish, Rosetta Stone Spanish, SpanishDict…and many many more, see our top-level guide to learn Spanish, with links to all kinds of related info and well over one hundred Spanish learning resource reviews.
Here the best are organized by their strengths in particular areas.
For those of us backpacking in exotic lands, trying to live on the fewest dollars per day, there is also a Bargain Basement section.
Let’s see what we’ve got…
Table of Contents
Table of Best Apps to Learn Spanish
Links below will send you to the app websites, and the app details are down below.
OVERALL BEST
Best for Oral Communication Skills: Pimsleur
Best Spanish Learning App 1-1 Immersion: Baselang
Best App in the Style of a Podcast: SpanishPod101
Best Spanish Learning App Structure: Babbel
Best for Customizing Your Learning Path: Ouino
Best Gamified Spanish Learning App: LingoDeer
READING AND LISTENING
Best for Interesting Content: Newsdle
Best for Learning on the Go: Pimsleur
SPEAKING AND WRITING
Best for Feedback on Writing: italki
Best for Feedback on Pronunciation: Speechling
VOCABULARY ACQUISITION
Best Dictionary App: SpanishDict
Best for Easy Vocabulary Practice: Memrise
Most Customizable Vocabulary Practice: Anki
Best for Practice in Context: Clozemaster
TUTORS AND LANGUAGE EXCHANGES
Best for Finding any Tutor: italki
Second-Best for Finding a Tutor: Verbling
Overall Best Spanish Learning Apps
Best for Oral Communication Skills
Pimsleur Spanish
Any search for the best apps to learn Spanish should seriously consider the well-proven Pimsleur offering.
Pimsleur is an old-school course that began long before apps were even a thing.
My favorite thing about the Pimsleur app is that it gets you speaking Spanish right away. The lessons mostly ignore the written language and grammar, focusing on listening and speaking instead.
This means that students who use Pimsleur’s courses will almost certainly develop oral language skills more quickly than with other resources. Considering most people studying Spanish want to be able to use it in conversations right away, that makes it pretty appealing.
See our Super-Detailed Pimsleur Spanish Review
Best Spanish Learning App 1-1 Immersion
Baselang
This Spanish learning app should be at the top of your list if you want to learn in the shortest time with greatest intensity, and your budget allows.
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.
Many of our readers are taking advantage of Baselang’s unlimited Spanish classes. You should give it a try.
ALR Readers receive $10 off first month.
See our Super-Detailed Baselang Review
Best App in the Style of a Podcast
SpanishPod101
SpanishPod101 could potentially belong in the general courses category because it offers practice in a variety of skills. I’ve put it here because the lessons are mostly audio and the course structure isn’t completely linear.
The app contains a ton of content — there are nearly 2000 lessons ranging from absolute beginner to advanced levels, though the majority of content is designed for learners at a lower level.
Lessons are presented in a podcast-style format. Two hosts discuss and translate a dialogue, providing plenty of grammar notes and cultural information. There’s quite a bit of English happening at the lower levels, but this phases out as you progress to more advanced material.
Save 25% on a subscription by using the coupon code ‘ALLLANGUAGERESOURCES‘.
See our Super-Detailed SpanishPod101 Review
Best Spanish Learning App Structure
Babbel Spanish
Babbel is pretty similar to Duolingo, Lingodeer, and a few other courses, but less gamified. It will have more of an appeal to learners looking for a no-nonsense study resource.
While their courses aren’t exactly unique, they’re well-structured and generally solid. What they lack in flash, they make up for with the quality of their courses.
It’s affordable, teaches useful Spanish that you’ll need in real life, and explains grammar very clearly.
See our Super-Detailed Babbel Spanish Review
Best Spanish Learning app for Customizing Your Learning Path
Ouino
Ouino earned its place as one of the best apps to learn Spanish after we reviewed it, specifically the Spanish version.
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.
You may like this Spanish version as much as we did.
Limited 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. 🙂
See our Super-Detailed Ouino Review
Best Gamified Spanish Learning App
Lingodeer
Lingodeer is one of several closely-related apps, newer than most in its class. I’ve listed it before the others because it’s the one I tend to recommend the most for new students getting started with Spanish.
The app structures its lessons around a variety of themes and offers practice opportunities in a variety of exercises, testing your understanding in multiple ways.
There are several reasons I prefer Lingodeer over similar apps. It’s got better audio quality, informative grammar explanations, and a greater variety of exercise types, which keeps things interesting. It’s also offered at a comparable price, some of the content free.
See our Super-Detailed Lingodeer Review
Apps to Learn Spanish Reading and Listening
Putting yourself in a position to read and listen to a lot of Spanish material around your level is extremely useful for improving your overall skills. Since both of these skills involve consuming media, there are a number of resources that are worth looking at. With many of these apps, you’ll be able to practice both reading and listening simultaneously.
Best App for Interesting Fresh Content
Newsdle News Based Graded Reader
Newsdle is one of my favorite resources for improving Spanish. Every day, Newsdle adds 3 brand new news-based Spanish lessons so you will always have super fresh content to study. They have two variations, one which teaches Spanish from Spain and one that teaches Latin American Spanish; proficiency grade levels are from Beginner to Advanced Higher, total of 6 levels, so you can see how you are progressing quite easily. If you are intermediate Spanish learners, give Newsdle a spin.
They release weekly podcast episodes focusing on current events and culture, while also teaching some grammar and expressions. I love their teaching methodology as it’s both effective and a lot of fun.
Best for Learning on the Go
Pimsleur Spanish
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.
See our Super-Detailed Pimsleur Spanish Review
Apps for Spanish Speaking and Writing
Best for Feedback on Writing
italki
italki is the most flexible and affordable place to find a Spanish speaking tutor. 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. Then, practice speaking Spanish with your tutor at your own pace. Teachers are able to set their own prices and make their own schedule.
See our Super-Detailed italki Review
Best for Feedback on Spanish Pronunciation
Speechling
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 Spanish speakers. The Unlimited Plan provides unlimited corrections of your recordings by a teacher.
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.
See our Super-Detailed Speechling Review
Learn Spanish Vocabulary with Apps
Best Spanish Dictionary App
SpanishDict
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.
See our Super-Detailed SpanishDict Review
Best for Easy Vocabulary Practice
Memrise
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.
See our Super-Detailed Memrise Review
Most Customizable Vocabulary Practice
Anki
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.
See our Super-Detailed Anki Review
Best for Practice in Context
Clozemaster
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.
See our Super-Detailed Clozemaster Review
Tutors and Spanish Language Exchange Apps
Best for Finding a Tutor
italki
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.
See our Super-Detailed italki Review
Second-Best for Finding a Tutor
Verbling
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.
See our Super-Detailed Verbling Review
Maybe Try These Spanish Learning Apps
Not too surprisingly, a lot of courses (even the old-school ones) are now fully accessible through an app. it’s worth noting, however, that these are not necessarily the best ways to learn Spanish. Rather, they’re the Spanish courses that also have apps. For a comprehensive look at all the different course options you’ll have, I suggest reading our post about the best Spanish courses.
Busuu
Busuu is another very popular app and its Spanish course is pretty good. Although it may not do as well with grammar as Babbel, the incorporation of writing and speech corrections from other users is a stand out feature.
See our Super-Detailed Busuu Review
Coursera
Coursera offers online courses from universities around the world, open for registration at any time, and self-paced. Advanced learners can take courses on many different subjects taught in Spanish, and others will be able to find courses teaching the language. Courses are free, and most offer a certification upon completion if you’re willing to pay.
edX
edX is an online learning platform that offers free university courses. A certificate is usually available upon completion for a fee. The platform offers the structure and quality you can expect from a university course while allowing learners to progress at their own pace. Course topics vary widely; take one of the various Spanish language courses or one on another topic that’s taught in Spanish.
FluentU
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.
See our Super-Detailed FluentU Review
Mango Languages
This app is available in a ton of different languages and has some nifty features, but it doesn’t stand out over similar apps.
See our Super-Detailed Mango Languages Review
Mondly
This one takes a similar approach to other popular options, but it underperforms in pretty much every area. The lessons aren’t well-structured, the design isn’t as good as other apps, and they don’t explain important things like conjugation rules, among other issues.
See our Super-Detailed Mondly Review
Rocket Spanish
Rocket Spanish is… just OK. It’s got lessons that focus on teaching useful language through a variety of practice methods and grammar explanations, but it never goes above and beyond.
See our Super-Detailed Rocket Spanish Review
Rosetta Stone Spanish
One of the more famous resources, Rosetta Stone avoids explanations in favor of teaching language purely through exposure. The lessons are repetitive, boring, and not worth the cost.
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.
See our Super-Detailed Rosetta Stone Spanish Review
Synergy Spanish
Synergy Spanish teaches the language through sentence repetition. Unfortunately, the instruction isn’t thorough and the app feels outdated.
See our Super-Detailed Synergy Spanish Review
Udemy
Udemy is an online platform where users can create and sell their own courses on any subject. The majority of Spanish courses are aimed at beginners, but there are some options for learners at all levels. Keep in mind that quality will vary from course to course and that courses are frequently offered at major discounts.
A few of the resources mentioned in the video aren’t available as apps, but can be found in our post about the best Spanish courses. Be sure to subscribe and stay tuned for the second video where we cover 12 more good apps and courses for learning Spanish.
Best Free(mium) Apps for Learning Spanish
On a budget? Welcome to the Bargain Basement where you can find the best free or freemium apps to learn Spanish
Free and Interactive Spanish App
Duolingo
Duolingo is an insanely popular app, among the most famous language learning platforms in the game. Launched in 2011, it’s a free program that has opened up language learning to people all over the world (over 100 million downloads in the Google Play Store).
It teaches Spanish, among many other languages, in short, easy, gamified lessons. This approach makes learning Spanish much less intimidating, and it’s especially good for those who may struggle with motivation.
Here are a few things I don’t love: the audio recordings for many sentences don’t sound natural (which can be a huge problem for new learners), there are lots of nonsensical sentences that you would never say, and their grammar tips aren’t included in the app. Still, it’s not a bad way to get started with Spanish.
See our Super-Detailed Duolingo Review
Best Free Audio App
Language Transfer
The Language Transfer project has been in development since 2011, but 2020 saw the first app launch for the program on both iOS and Android – available for free. The LT Spanish course is made up of 90 audio lessons that help learners build a foundation in the language by teaching a method for thinking your way through it.
The course is best for English speakers, as the instruction draws heavily on the similarities between English and Spanish. It’s also better for learners that don’t need to be visually stimulated as they learn – this isn’t a fancy app with animations or pictures. As far as quality of instruction and learning potential, it’s hard to beat the value of a free app like Language Transfer.
See our Super-Detailed Language Transfer Review
Best Upper-Level Reading Content
LingQ
LingQ is a very useful app where you can find interesting material to practice reading and listening, regardless of your Spanish level. Much of the content has actually been added by users, so you may already be familiar with some of the sources. For example, there are podcasts from Radio Ambulante, textbook passages, news stories, and much more. You can also add your own material to read.
As you read, the words you don’t need to look up are marked “known.” This gives you a very broad measure of how many words you know. There are a bunch of other features that I think are either pointless or bad value such as their avatars, points, and tutors. A subscription costs $12.99 per month.
Readlang, a browser extension, can actually do many of the same things as LingQ for free.
See our Super-Detailed LingQ Review
Best Free App for Side-By-Side Reading Practice
Beelinguapp
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.
See our Super-Detailed Beelinguapp Review
Best Free Vocabulary Acquisition Apps
The free or freemium apps for learning Spanish vocabulary, from SpanishDict, Memrise and Anki, are described above in the previous Vocabulary Acquisition Section.
Best Free Apps for Tutors and Language Exchanges
HelloTalk
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.
See our Super-Detailed HelloTalk Review
Tandem
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.
See our Super-Detailed Tandem Review
So, What is the Best App for YOU to Learn Spanish?
A comforting thought is that there are many apps that fit your learning styles and help you acquire Spanish, and we hope to help you find ones that do that. Although there is no single best app for learning Spanish, just like there isn’t only one top way to learn Spanish, most apps come with free trial periods, so try out a few different apps to see which ones match your personality.