What's the Best Language-Learning App for You?

Do you want to learn a new language from scratch or brush up on one you've studied before? Language learning apps help you learn and study languages at your own pace. You can work through lessons from the comfort of your home or during your commute on a mobile app. Some programs focus on helping you understand and speak a new language, while others are better for reading and writing. Some help you build a foundation for a lifetime of learning, some just teach travel phrases.

What makes a language-learning app best for you? The answer is highly personal and depends on a number of factors. Does the app offer the language you want to study? Where and how do you like to study? Some people like to sit and focus for a half hour everyday. Others consider language-learning a casual hobby and want a mobile app with a game-like experience. You need to pick a program that's right for your language education level, too, whether you're a beginner or already have some experience. Not every app can do it all. It's important to find one that meets your needs.

What Do the Best Language-Learning Apps Have in Common?

Still, the best language-learning apps do share a few things. We've tested dozens of apps over several years to determine which ones are best for which users. For starters, the best language instruction apps have a thorough amount of content, teaching not only vocabulary but also verb conjugations, grammar, and so forth. Second, they work smoothly. Learning a language is frustrating, but the app you use shouldn't be. Language apps that are the true cream of the crop are sticky, meaning they have a je ne sais quois that compels you to return to them day after day. Learning a language requires dedication, and your motivation could wane if you don't like your app very much.

There are so many excellent programs that can teach languages, no matter what your needs or your budget. Sure, Google Translate and Microsoft Translator are getting better all the time, but too often they still fail miserably. Here you'll find recommendations for the ten best language-learning apps, including the best free program, the best for beginners, and the best for improving a language you've studied before.

The Best Free Language-Learning App

The best free language-learning app is Duolingo, hands down. Duolingo is available as both a web app and mobile app, and it works well whether you're a total beginner or already have some experience. If you've studied the language before, you can take a placement test to find the right place to start.

Duolingo is easy to use and has bite-size lessons. It's one of the best apps to use if you plan to practice a language in short sessions during your spare time. Duolingo also has some gamification to it, so you can set a goal for yourself, such as trying to earn 30 points per day. The more you hit your goal, the more bonus points you earn. You can spend points on little perks and extras in the app. There's also a leaderboard so that you can compare your progress with your friends'.

Duolingo currently offers 30 languages, excluding English and fictional languages: You can choose from Chinese, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Esperanto, French, German, Greek, Hawaiian (in beta), Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian (in beta), Indonesian (in beta), Irish, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Navajo (in beta), Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese (Brazilian), Romanian, Russian, Spanish, Swahili, Swedish, Turkish, Ukrainian, Vietnamese, and Welsh. An Arabic course is in development, too.

The Best Paid Language-Learning App

Among paid language-learning apps, Rosetta Stone is hard to beat. It's reliable, accurate, and thorough, with programs for 28 languages (excluding English). Each lesson takes around 30 minutes to complete, and even if you do one lesson per day, there's enough content to keep you busy for months.

Some people complain that Rosetta Stone is repetitive and a little dry, but the deductive learning method it uses stands out as being much more memorable than other programs that use, say, flashcards as their primary teaching method. The interface is also gorgeous. Rosetta Stone keeps track of your progress, scores you as you complete exercises, and repeats important ideas to keep them fresh in your mind. It incorporates reading, writing, speaking, and listening equally. You can pay extra to add private or group e-tutoring sessions via a video call.

Rosetta Stone offers language learning programs for businesses, too, such as Rosetta Stone Catalyst. These spin-off programs are extremely similar to the consumer version of the app. The business version also comes with the ability to generate reports so that administrators can see how much progress a person or department has made with the language.

The Best Program With a Virtual Teacher

Language-learning software programs are self-paced and sometimes even self-directed. Not everyone thrives in such an independent learning environment, however. If you like to have a teacher who explains the language to you, Fluenz is a wonderful option.

Fluenz uses video lessons to present material and follows them with more standard interactive exercises where you practice what you learned. When you're first starting out with a language, seeing another human being speak it, watching their facial movements and seeing their smile, can make it feel less intimidating. As Fluenz progresses, the instructor walks you through lessons in not only pronunciation and grammar, but culture, too. If you learn best when you see a familiar face, Fluenz is a great program to pick. The company also sells an enticing Spanish immersion program, in case you needed an excuse to stay in a mansion in Mexico City for a week.

Fluenz offers seven language courses: Chinese (Mandarin with Pinyin writing), French, German, Italian, Portuguese (Brazilian), Latin American Spanish, and European Spanish.

The Best Language App for Brushing Up

If you've studied a language before and find that most language-learning apps are too easy, try Yabla. Imagine a streaming service that lets you easily find videos in the language you're learning, with options to show both closed captioning in the native language and English subtitles. That, in a nutshell, is Yabla. The app incorporates exercises, too, but the videos are the hook. Many of the videos were not produced specifically for language learners: They're real video footage with native speakers using a natural pace and accent.

Yabla offers six languages: Chinese, French, German, Italian, and Spanish, plus an English program for Spanish speakers.

The Best Language App for Audio Learners

If you're the kind of person who can get immersed in podcasts and audiobooks, you might consider an audio-focused language learning program. Two that stand out are Pimsleur and Michel Thomas. Each is named after the person who created the learning technique used in the program. Both were once sold as tapes, then CDs, and now in apps.

Pimsleur, named for Dr. Paul Pimsleur, uses a method that focuses on the amount of time that has elapsed from when you last used a word to when you must recall it. Each lesson takes about 30 minutes, and you're supposed to do exactly one lesson per day. While you don't learn to read and write (unless you teach yourself using optional PDF booklets), you do refine your pronunciation.

The method used in Michel Thomas is different. Michel Thomas was a polyglot who developed a method of informal teaching. It involves putting people into a classroom and teaching them to say phrases that can then be paired together in new ways to create longer sentences. When you buy the Michel Thomas program, you hear the recording from one of these classrooms, and you're supposed to play along as if you were there.

The Best Language App for Obscure Languages

Most language-learning software is available for Spanish, French, German, Italian, and Portuguese. What do you do if you need to learn Igbo or Ojibwe?

When you're in a bind to find an app for a language you want to learn, there are two sources to try: Transparent Language Online and Mango Languages (which didn't make the cut for this list). Transparent Language Online has programs for more than 100 languages. Some of those programs are short, but the company is adding to them over time. Mango Languages is an option if you're stuck, though it's not an app that I recommend highly. For some languages, however, it may be your only option.

The Best Language App for Travel

Not everyone needs a language-learning app to study a language. For example, maybe you need an app where you can write down vocabulary you want to review. The free app Quizlet is exactly that. The software lets you create unique content that you want to study, and it's excellent with foreign languages.

Though Quizlet may sound like yet another boring flashcard app, it offers different tools to mix up your study sets and how you review them so your learning never gets stale. You can work on fill-in-the-blanks questions or even play games with your unique study sets. The tools are nicely animated, and the app offers speech-to-text features for pronunciation help, too. Be sure to indicate the language you're studying for the best pronunciation.

Get Talking!

Most software-based language programs help you learn a base of vocabulary and grammar, but they won't turn you into a fluent speaker. For that, you need to practice with other human beings and come up with things you genuinely want to say, rather than words that an app is prompting you to learn. Using the apps listed below can teach you a lot, though, so develop a base knowledge first with them and then go out and use your skills in the real world. If one of the apps sounds good to you, you can click the links and read the full review for a deeper dive.

Best Language-Learning Software Featured in this Roundup:

• Rosetta Stone Language Learning Review

  
  MSRP: $179.00
  

  Pros: Excellent user experience. Highly intuitive. Polished interface on desktop and mobile. Optional online tutoring sessions. Great bonus reading content.

  Cons: Lacks cultural information and translations. No placement test. Repetitive.

  Bottom Line: Rosetta Stone remains the best premium software for building a foundation in a foreign language. It's excellent for beginners, and optional online classes give it an edge over other programs.

  Read Review

• Fluenz Review

  
  MSRP: $187.00
  

  Pros: Excellent core content. Well suited for beginners and for long-term use. Thorough. App design prevents distractions.

  Cons: Limited number of languages. Only basic voice recording. No live web classes.

  Bottom Line: Fluenz recreates aspects of classroom learning in its foreign language instruction. It's one of the best pieces of language-learning software on the market, but it only offers a few languages.

  Read Review

• Simon & Schuster Pimsleur Comprehensive Review

  
  MSRP: $119.95
  

  Pros: Excellent for learning to speak and understand spoken languages. Superbly structured. Programs for 50 languages, plus ESL courses.

  Cons: A primarily audio-based service, with PDFs; doesn't teach reading or writing. Expensive. Digital version with interactive exercises for 8 languages only.

  Bottom Line: Pimsleur is one of the most accurate and effective programs for learning to speak and understand a new language. This audio-based system won't teach you reading or writing, however, nor does it have any games or interactive exercises.

  Read Review

• Babbel Review

  
  MSRP: $12.95
  

  Pros: Well-structured courses. High quality materials unique to each language. Inexpensive.

  Cons: Not highly engaging. Little exercise variety. Content quantity varies by language.

  Bottom Line: Language-learning app Babbel teaches phrases and vocabulary you'll actually use. While the exercises can get dull, a low subscription price makes up for it.

  Read Review

• Rocket Languages Review

  
  MSRP: $149.95
  

  Pros: Materials are online, downloadable, and in mobile app. Courses in 12 languages. Blends audio instruction with interactive exercises. One-time fee for lifetime access.

  Cons: Clunky user experience. Not good at teaching non-Roman scripts.

  Bottom Line: Rocket Languages uses audio lessons, interactive exercises, and readings to teach you just enough of a new language for travel. The online experience could use a facelift, however.

  Read Review

• Yabla Review

  
  MSRP: $9.95
  

  Pros: Excellent for sharpening language listening. Uses a variety of speakers and accents. Plenty of videos with natural speech at a conversational pace.

  Cons: Lacks structure. Inconsistent quality. Few languages offered.

  Bottom Line: Yabla strengthens foreign language listening skills with thousands of videos and exercises based on them. It's excellent for people with prior language experience, but not ideal for novices.

  Read Review

• Transparent Language Online Review

  
  MSRP: $199.95
  

  Pros: Offers instruction in more than 100 languages. Clear learning path and structure. Excellent speech analysis. Appropriately challenging.

  Cons: Writing and spelling exercises could be more polished. Some languages have more content than others. Pricier than others.

  Bottom Line: If you need to learn a language, there's a good chance Transparent Language Online teaches it. It's not the flashiest app, but it offers excellent education in a huge variety of languages.

  Read Review

• Michel Thomas Review

  
  MSRP: $6.99
  

  Pros: Teaching method forces you to fully recall words. Emphasizes listening and speaking high-frequency words.

  Cons: Minimal reading and no writing. No interactive materials. Confusing purchasing options and prices.

  Bottom Line: Michel Thomas' language-learning method is designed to give you functional skills. The audio courses bring you into the world of the spoken language, but it doesn't teach reading or writing.

  Read Review

• Duolingo Review

  
  MSRP: $0.00
  

  Pros: Free. Wonderful new podcast and interactive stories for some languages. Clear structure. Lets you test out of lessons that are too easy. Long list of supported languages.

  Cons: Varying quantity of material for different languages.

  Bottom Line: Duolingo is the best free online language learning program. Unique features and a clear structure make it a reliable place to learn new languages or sharpen your skills.

  Read Review

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