Multilingual Mastery

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Trancy Review: Language Reactor alternative with tons of potential

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Trancy review

In recent years, the concept of learning a language on YouTube and Netflix has made way for lots of new opportunities to learn foreign languages for free. First, there was CaptionPop, then Language Reactor, and now we have this Trancy review.

So how does Trancy compare to the competition and how do you know if you should use it to learn a language? Let’s discuss what this Chrome extension does well, what it doesn’t, and what kind of language learner it’s for.

Trancy languages

While you can use Trancy to learn a language with any YouTube video or Netflix show/movie, it only supports the following languages:

  • Chinese
  • Egnlish
  • French
  • German
  • Italian
  • Japanese
  • Korean
  • Portuguese
  • Spanish

Now, when I say ‘only’, that isn’t to say that it’s a bad thing; on the contrary, if it’s designed to support just a handful of languages, the quality of the translation is probably better than much of the competition.

I’m not a translator so I can’t speak on this for sure, but it is a pattern that I see across language learning resources: the fewer the languages, the higher the quality of the education.

That said, let’s dive into what it’s like to use Trancy to learn a language!

How to use Trancy

Trancy is a Chrome extension, so once you enable it in your browser, booting it up is just a matter of clicking the little icon in the bottom right-hand corner of your video.

It is worth noting that Trancy is not compatible with AdBlock, so if you rely on it for your viewing experience that may prove to be an obstacle. There is a tutorial preventing AdBlock from stopping Trancy from working, but honestly, it’s a lot of work and if I’m using Trancy myself, I’ll just turn off AdBlock temporarily.

After you click the logo, you’ll get a theater-esque screen with bilingual subtitles and a few icons in the corner. These icons initiate the features of Trancy that I feel are really special. But we’ll talk about those in a second.

First, let’s talk about the functionality of the subtitles themselves (keeping in mind this isn’t where this Chrome extension truly shines).

They’re smooth, functional, and easy to read. You can easily turn the original and translated subtitles on and off, and save either entire sentences or single words for later.

While you don’t get the option to blur out the translated subtitles when you’re watching a video like Language Reactor does, this feature does show up in practice mode which we haven’t gotten to yet. Just in case you were missing that part in the video above like I was.

Trancy also gives you the option to switch modes between focusing on the video itself or the subtitles, which can be a nice customizable feature. You can get the benefit of the video while also being able to really focus on the words. A little bit of customization like that can really go a long way.

Suffice it to say that the subtitles themselves are beautiful. No real complaints here – if anything, I’m just being nit-picky. So let’s look at my favorite feature of Trancy: practice mode.

Trancy review: practice mode

Once you boot up Trancy, slide your mouse over and click “Practice mode”, the headphones icon. Or just tap P on your keyboard. Here you’ll get the video’s subtitles already created into 5 different activities:

  • Speaking
  • Listening
  • Selection
  • Filling
  • Dictation

This is how each activity functions.

Trancy is a new Chrome extension. These features aren’t amazing yet, but there’s a lot of potential.

For example, I would love it if you could go into settings and turn on/off different things, like if the audio clip repeats after you get it correct, access to letters and accents that you may not have on your keyboard, and that pesky timer in the upper right-hand corner.

Some might like the timer, but it gives me a lot of anxiety. I feel like I have to rush to find the answers. Let me disable that clock!

Regardless, the basic concept is unique and a real benefit to language learners. And if activities like this are what you’re already doing but with fewer steps, I do recommend you switch over to using Trancy.

Collections

As you’ve seen in the videos above, you can “heart” any word or sentence to save and study it for later. When you’re ready to do that, you can visit the Trancy website/platform and easily see what you’ve saved.

This is what that looks like.

Again, interesting concept, but this could use work.

I would love to see Trancy using the audio from the actual video as opposed to a robot voice. This would be more helpful for understanding the language as it’s used by native speakers and actual humans, which is an entirely different experience.

Learning to understand a new language means training your brain to connect different sounds to the same words, which is why watching videos is excellent for listening comprehension. Losing that quality of the words you’re saving is really more significant than you may think!

Secondly, I understand that subtitles don’t always break at natural sentence endings. But that sentence isn’t a sentence. It’s 2 and a half sentences. This means that either you just deal with funky practice, or you go in and manually shift your sentences around.

You do get the option to download your saved terms as a PDF or .csv, but it doesn’t include audio. If you want to add audio to your flashcards (assuming you already have a chosen study tool), you’ll have the extra step of finding or creating your own audio.

Trancy’s AI functions

When visiting your collections, you may have noticed a couple of AI functions. They honestly feel kind of random and out of left field when you’re just trying to study your material, but they could be beneficial if you give them a shot.

For example, Trancy offers AI chatbot conversations. This isn’t a new concept at all, but I’m genuinely impressed by the functionality! With other chatbots (say, Lingodeer or Mondly), the conversation is pre-planned. It’s practice, but it’s stale. Trancy, on the other hand, uses AI to bring this tech to life.

I’m surprised!

This was a whole conversation that would be incredibly helpful when it comes to thinking in and using a foreign language. Definitely a helpful step between learning words and real-life conversations.

P.S. You can also access all these functions on mobile via the Trancy app! On both Android and Apple, you can practice all of your saved collections and the AI features on any mobile device. It doesn’t include watching the functionality of the Chrome extension, so you can’t watch videos and collect new terms, but it’s something.

Trancy review: cost

The basic premise of this Chrome extension is free. If you find yourself using Trancy consistently, you can opt-in for upgrades including:

  • save unlimited words and sentences
  • unlimited practice
  • enhanced translation
  • AI-powered word/syntax explanations
  • speaking practice

Fortunately for us, Trancy keeps it cheap; here’s the explanation behind their pricing:

Trancy Premium is a paid option, as most Premium features require Trancy to pay addition fees to third parties such as data center providers and openAI. Contributions from premium users allow us to cover these costs and help keep trancy free for everyone.

I hope this approach is successful for Trancy, because it keeps language learning accessible to all. Honestly, it’s only a few bucks a month, which is a no-brainer if you find yourself using it a lot.

You can see Trancy’s updated pricing here.

Trancy review: should you try it?

Now that we’ve reached the end of this Trancy review, is it the Chrome extension for you? Here are some thoughts.

If you enjoy watching videos in your target language and would get even more practice with Trancy automatically creating activities from subtitles, I highly recommend Trancy. I love how it automatically creates engaging, functional activities out of the media you’re already watching, so you can activate all of your language skills, not just your listening skills.

Plus, the chatbot is surprisingly great! That feature in itself is a 10/10.

Click here to get started with Trancy!

However, there are a lot of small, nit-picky issues that are only really cons when compared to other options that have been around longer, and therefore have had more time to iron these things out. So if you’re perfectly happy using Language Reactor to create your own activities and avoid some small functionality issues, you may be just fine doing that.

Or, if you want a heavier focus on the activities and don’t really care about the videos themselves, I might recommend Yabla or FluentU to help with that.

Language Reactor review: learn languages with Netflix with ease

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Language Reactor (formerly known as Language Learning with Netflix [LLN] and Language Learning with YouTube [LLY]) is a fairly new Chrome extension that language learners are loving to help them enjoy foreign language movies and series. And in this Language Reactor review, we’re talking about why.

Let’s dive into how to use Language Reactor, why, and the absolute plethora of options (+ counting!) that are available for language learners who want to use foreign language media to learn a language.

Language Reactor: an overview

Language Reactor’s job is to take the subtitles already available in any given video and present them in a way that is engaging and significantly more useful for learning a language.

This is an important distinction: alone, subtitles are meant for audiences that are hard of hearing, process spoken words a little slowly, or any number of needs that can benefit from accommodations.

And while they are helpful for foreign language audiences, it can take a lot of creativity to get the most out of them…without Language Reactor. That said, let’s look at the opportunities offered to us when watching our favorite Netflix series.

From the get-go, with Language Reactor’s most basic settings, you get the following tools:

  • current subtitles in the target language, front and center
  • their translation into your native language
  • an overview of the previous/next subtitles, with their translations
  • automatic pausing when reviewing specific words or phrases

And all of these options are completely customizable; over time, they can be used to highlight new words, highlight difficult words, or you can hide them altogether. We’ll look at these options more in detail later.

These options are just the tip of the iceberg of this Language Reactor review – let’s see what else we can do!

Learning new words with Language Learning with Netflix

Language Reactor is most powerful when it comes to how many ways language learners can use subtitles to learn a language. This includes simple features, like getting the translations of words when you roll over them, to the most advanced use cases, like building up your vocab in order of frequency words (i.e. the most common words in the language first, the least common ones last).

While this tool is best for intermediate or advanced language learners – as beginners likely don’t have the comprehension level to understand anything – this does make Language Reactor more of an option for beginners! It’s easy to focus on the most useful beginner words first, before diving into more complex, niche vocabulary.

Watch the above video to see features in action like:

  • roll over words to pause and translate
  • click to see:
    • translations
    • synonyms
    • other occurrences of the word in the episode
    • links to the word in your favorite online dictionary
  • find other example sentences with the word in Tatoeba (a commonly-used source of sentences for language learners, like in platforms like Clozemaster)
  • read, listen to, translate, and save any sentence, be it in the episode itself or one of the sentences sourced from Tatoeba
  • sorting the words presented in the transcript from most common to least common

And, finally, the option to color-code your vocabulary words to easily differentiate between words that you know, words that you’re learning, and words that aren’t important to you, so you can ignore them.

Holy options, Batman!

Note: in the above video, the audio clips don’t match up at all when choosing other occurrences of a word in the episode, but the Tatoeba clips match up just fine. I can’t say whether that’s a platform glitch or a ‘me’ thing.

Speed options in Language Reactor

Depending on any particular show or movie (or your comprehension level in different languages), it can be helpful to have finely tuned controls when it comes to speed. Fortunately, Language Reactor’s tools here are both helpful and very easy to find and use.

Specifically, it can take a few tries to process the meaning of a sentence. This is why Language Reactor offers users the ability to:

  • automatically pause after every line
  • repeat sentences with just a keystroke
  • speed up and slow down audio in real time

It is worth noting that while it’s super accessible to be able to slow down audio, I don’t personally recommend doing so, or at least not long-term.

If you’re just starting out, that’s fine, but your intention should be building up your foreign language comprehension so that you can understand the audio at its native speed – this is because depending on slower audio will teach you to recognize different sounds.

Therefore, unless you’re only interested in listening to media where you can control the speed (so limited understanding of things like conversations and music), I’d make sure to build up your comprehension to not depend on that particular feature!

How to customize Language Reactor

Because Language Reactor depends on the content already on Netflix and YouTube, this Chrome extension truly succeeds in giving language learners the power to customize the tool for themselves.

Many of these settings can depend on the media you’re watching – for example, if you’re watching Las Chicas del Cable like I was in preparation for Language TV Club, don’t count on switching to something like Thai without double-checking.

In this case, you can use the Catalogues, which we’ll see in a second.

Clicking around the settings, you can customize options like:

  • audio language (i.e. the language native to the show/movie, or dubbed audio)
  • subtitle language
  • translation language (your native language or another advanced language)
  • show/hide subtitles
  • playback speed
  • keyboard shortcuts for efficient playback

Netflix and YouTube Catalogues

There’s no disagreement about how powerful this Chrome extension is, but where do you start? There is so much content on both platforms, it can undoubtedly be overwhelming to not only search for something that any given language learner will enjoy but also supports their target/native language.

Fortunately, right on the Language Reactor website, you can browse their searchable catalogues!

Select the appropriate platform and have fun exploring the content available based on settings like genre, country, number of subscribers, and even just directly searching for a show or keyword you’re interested in.

While you can click directly into whatever you choose, I do wish the Netflix movies/shows linked you to the “more info” page, not directly to the media. This just adds an extra step to browsing media that can get really frustrating really quickly.

You can also see new options available shortly, including using text or video files to create your own experience, which would put Language Reactor in direct competition with LingQ! I’m excited to see how these features turn out.

Saved & highlighted vocab

Once you’ve picked your media and consumed it however you like, Language Reactor’s final magic trick is how it helps you to learn vocab!

This is a powerful ability, although it’s a paid one (but only like $5/month). Based on the aforementioned ranking of words (most commonly used to least) and combined with the words you save as you watch Netflix/YouTube, the options are essentially limitless.

Thanks to Language Reactor’s help, it’s easy to pick out new words as they come up in your watching and fill in the blanks based on your level (or not).

Once you have your words picked out, easily export them into whatever flashcard tool you prefer, like Anki or any other platform that allows you to create your own flashcards by uploading an Excel sheet.

At this point, this Language Reactor review is a bit more for the technologically savvy language learner, or at least those who have their own flashcard system for bulk-uploading terms, especially via .csv or similar.

However, this does have more to do with the flashcard platform than Language Reactor itself; it’s easy enough to download the file, not necessarily quite so easy to upload it to various resources. Looking for a flashcard system? Try the “bulk upload” option in my app search.

Language Reactor review: the pros and cons

This Language Reactor review undoubtedly proves that language learners who already enjoy using YouTube or Netflix to learn a language should not sleep on this tool. Just install the Chrome extension, and you’re good to go – while there are tons of options to customize your subtitles, you don’t have to make any decisions until you want to.

Language Reactor is already wildly helpful just as a free Chrome extension, but the paid subscription (priced at only $5/month) makes the process of learning a language with Netflix and YouTube exponentially more useful. I’ve been a fan of this tool since its inception.

However, because of the immersion style of learning, you’ll likely need to have at least an intermediate level of comprehension in your target language. Beginners can find value in this tool, but you’ll have to be picky about what/how much you want to understand.

You’ll also need regular access to a computer, as Language Reactor is a Chrome extension and therefore only works on a desktop or laptop computer.

Otherwise, you’ve got nothing to lose – click here to try Language Reactor for yourself!

LingQ review: probably not worth your time

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LingQ (pronounced like ‘link’) is excellent for language learners who want to pick up vocabulary through reading and listening to audiobooks, stories, podcasts, etc. Given that it’s such a huge, popular resource, there’s a lot to say about it – some of it good, some bad. In this LingQ review, you’ll get a taste of it all.

In this LingQ review, learn if LingQ is the language app for you, or if it’s just not worth it.

LingQ review: languages

One thing that’s excellent about LingQ is that you can create your own content (more on that later) in the following languages:

  • Arabic
  • Chinese (Mandarin)
  • Czech
  • Dutch
  • English
  • Esperanto
  • Finnish
  • French
  • German
  • Greek
  • Hebrew
  • Italian
  • Japanese
  • Korean
  • Latin
  • Norwegian
  • Polish
  • Portuguese
  • Romanian
  • Russian
  • Spanish
  • Swedish
  • Turkish
  • Ukrainian

LingQ review: your dashboard

LingQ’s dashboard has been modernized in recent years, in an effort to be a more “bingeable” way to learn languages.

There’s a lot of information to take in, and I wish there were some sort of tutorial or something first because if I hadn’t been using this platform for years, I would have no idea where to start!

LingQ has a history of being…not very user-friendly, and that hasn’t changed. There’s a lot to take in here.

  • every video shows you how many words you know and how many you don’t*
  • you can see the percentage of words you don’t know*
  • while each cover photo is in your target language, it’ll automatically translate as soon as you roll over it
  • you can scroll through different categories of audio lessons, including Steve Kaufmann (co-creator of LingQ)’s podcast
  • you can search for specific content based on level or keywords

*neither of these stats is accurate if you don’t use LingQ religiously

Of course, like any other Netflix-esque platform, the more you use it, the better it can recommend you content that you’ll actually use.

So let’s move onto what it’s like to actually learn a language with LingQ.

LingQ review: basic lesson

Click to any video that you can see on your dashboard to get started with a LingQ lesson.

Once you press play, you’ll hear an audio recording in your target language, and it’s your responsibility to follow along with the written words.

Don’t get distracted or lost, though, because there’s literally no way to find your way back if you do. There’s on highlight to follow along with…the audio doesn’t even automatically turn the page, so you can be at the end of the audio but still on the first page, and you wouldn’t even know.

Plus, collecting new vocab words (i.e. LingQs)? What a pain. Not only does the audio not automatically stop to give you a second to learn the new word, but it gives you a robot voice for that word instead of just rewinding the audio a little bit.

I hate it. Maybe I’m spoiled by Language Reactor which makes it genuinely easy to learn new vocabulary by watching foreign language movies and TV. But just in that clip alone, I was stumbling so hard to pause the audio and catch up wit the word I just collected, I completely lost track of everything.

The idea is to make language learning easier, not more difficult.

LingQ review: words and lesson history

To find the LingQs (vocab words) you’ve collected within these lessons, click over to Vocabulary.

Again, LingQ’s usability is…wanting. While you do get to see how (theoretically) well you know any particular term, it’s hard to see what you’re supposed to do here. Again: mild inconvenience for some, completely handicapping for others.

The actual system of learning these LingQs definitely has potential, but it could also use some real help.

Fortunately, if you like finding your vocab using this method but have your own flashcard deck elsewhere, you can export all of your vocabulary to a CSV file, and upload that to any resource that’ll accept it.

The last tab, Playlist, holds your place if you’re in the middle of a book or series. This is definitely handy for when you click something in your Library feed, and it’s in the middle of a playlist or book.

Importing content to LingQ

LingQ has a plethora of practice options – tutors, forums, challenges, etc. – but I don’t want to spend time on those because they’re not really worth your time. There are plenty of other language learning resources that already do these things much better than LingQ could.

The important feature to know about LingQ is the ability to import content to use with LingQ’s technology

Anybody with an account can upload whatever content they like to the platform, and LingQ will stick it right into your feed. Either click the import button right from your dashboard or download the Chrome extension to import from anywhere on the internet.

You have three options: lesson, ebook, and vocab.

And, honestly, it’s pretty cool if you’re looking for a place to host your content all in one place, plus keep track of the vocabulary you’re learning in a centralized platform.

LingQ review: price

You can access any content at any time for free!

However, if you want to use LingQ as your primary language learning platform, you’ll definitely need to pay for premium due to the unlimited LingQs and unlimited imports.

You’ll also get access to all the other perks that I haven’t really mentioned in this LingQ review since other resources do those things much better, but if you decide to pay for premium, it might be worth taking advantage of them.

You can find updated prices for LingQ Premium here.

LingQ review: the bottom line

At the end of this LingQ review, it can be a great resource for you if the lack of usability doesn’t get in the way for you. If it’s as handicapping for you as it is for me, though, there are plenty of alternatives.

Readlang is my favorite for finding words and articles on the internet.

Lingvist is excellent for creating themed vocab lists, or lists from books you’re reading.

Language Reactor is best for new vocab in YouTube and Netflix media.

But if the cons mentioned in this LingQ review don’t dissuade you, LingQ is a solid option for finding new foreign language vocab through a variety of content available online!

MosaLingua review: more theory than active language practice

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MosaLingua is a combination website/mobile app that boasts its own unique method of learning a language, called The MOSA Learning Method. What is this method, what does it teach you, and how effective is MosaLingua for learning a language?

In this MosaLingua review, let’s find out.

MosaLingua review: languages

MosaLingua is an international company, and it’s pretty clear right from the get-go that they’re not English-centric in their communications. Currently, you can use MosaLingua to learn:

  • English
  • Business English
  • English TOEIC
  • English TOEFL
  • Medical English
  • Business Spanish
  • Arabic
  • Chinese
  • French
  • German
  • Italian
  • Japanese
  • Korean
  • Portuguese
  • Russian
  • Spanish

Let’s talk about what MosaLingua’s method actually is; the last time I saw a resource so proud of their strategy was Pimsleur, which can be effective for the right learner, but generally (in my opinion) is a bit overrated.

MosaLingua review: the method

As this MosaLingua review goes on, you’ll see why this part is so important. Apparently based on “several cognitive science and psychology concepts”, the MosaLingua method includes:

  • Spaced repetition (my fave!)
  • Active recall
  • Metacognition
  • The Pareto principle
  • Learner motivation and psychology

Those are a lot of fancy terms. What do they actually mean for us? I’ll take these concepts and explain them in not-so-formal terms that we can understand pretty easily.

  1. Spaced repetition: this one isn’t new to the language learning world at all, and it’s most popularly used with Anki. But you review words more or less depending on how difficult they are for you; you’ll also be shown old words just before you forget them. Very efficient.
  2. Active recall: multiple-choice questions aren’t the best because it’s easy enough to get them right without thinking. It’s like choosing the correct sentence between 5 sentences, you hear the word for “school”, and you pick the only sentence that has “school” in it. So MosaLingua doesn’t do that.
  3. Metacognition: once you answer right or wrong, report back on how easy or difficult it was for you. Again, something that Anki does very well.
  4. The Pareto principle: something like 80% of the conversations you’ll have in a language will use only 20% of the vocabulary. Learn high-frequency words first to learn more efficiently.
  5. Learner motivation and psychology: this is the concept that half of the struggle with learning a language is the barriers that we have in our minds. Defeat those to learn your language!

All that said, this method seems to be pretty much common sense.

MosaLingua review: getting started

Once you log in to MosaLingua, you’ll first be directed to take a 20-30 minute long test. I have never seen such a time-intensive start to learning a language, and especially not one that begins from such an advanced level.

I won’t put you through my whole test, but here’s how it started.

Feel free to take breaks when necessary (I certainly did), especially when switching sections. You’ll be tested on your use of all the language skills, and it’s tough even if it is multiple choice.

I do have to say it’s pretty accurate – MosaLingua judged my Spanish comprehension at a B2, and my grammar at an A2. At the end, you can submit your email to get these results in your email, but I don’t see any glaringly obvious “start here!” signs anywhere.

MosaDiscovery

Honestly, I spent about a week trying to find the meat of MosaLingua and I think I found it with their Chrome extension. It’s not clearly advertised within the online platform (or even the app, really), but MosaLingua’s strength starts with MosaDiscovery, the Chrome extension.

Find the link to download the Chrome extension within the “Premium” section of the app, as this is a premium feature.

Download MosaLingua’s MosaDiscovery Chrome extension, and collect new terms wherever on the internet you’re using the language! Just right-click, select “Add to MosaLingua”, edit the terms if you see fit, and then add them to your account.

Now you’ll have to download the MosaLingua app; be aware that there is a different app for each language, so pay attention and make sure you’re downloading the right one.

When you open the MosaLingua app, you’ll be directed to review these terms using the context in which they were found.

The app has you learn your new foreign language vocab using these strategies:

  1. Listen & repeat (AKA shadowing)
  2. Memorize
  3. Write
  4. Self-evaluate

It’s a perfectly decent approach, though not executed nearly as well as some other alternatives (which I’ll mention at the end of this MosaLingua review).

The best part of this whole strategy, though, is the process of collecting these words from the internet. This makes vocab collection easy and meaningful.

MosaLingua challenges

Next, on MosaLingua’s homepage (dashboard? The first page you land on when you log in) you’ll first see the option to choose a challenge after (or before, it’s up to you) you take the aforementioned test.

There’s no “challenges” section within the app. So basically, the idea behind these challenges is more of a mental note than anything else. When you select your challenge, you’ll get a few pointers for learning a language with books or music or whichever challenge you choose, but there’s no content or accountability provided.

MosaLingua’s courses

This is very confusing because MosaLingua labels these courses as optional, but they’re the only real content you can see if you’re on desktop. To access all the aforementioned vocabulary collection and review, you have to be on the app.

And no, MosaLingua won’t tell you this itself if you’re on desktop. I had to spend a significant amount of time figuring this out.

MosaLingua’s optional courses include MosaSeries, MosaSpeak, and MosaTraining.

MosaSeries

MosaSeries is a series of audio sessions that help you improve your listening comprehension, mostly. It’s targeted at beginners who are learning how to listen to and understand a new language.

There’s lots of words to read to guide you in a step-by-step for testing and improving your listening.

For the first lesson, for example, the image below the audio helps you gauge your abilities (as opposed to just a black-and-white “either you understand or you don’t” approach).

Then you’ll listen to a short, 2-minute audio clip starting the story of a man who wakes up with amnesia.

Lesson 2 is key vocab words in case you didn’t catch them, and lesson 3 is repeating lesson 1 again.

Finally, MosaSeries introduces the text (with the same audio) to help you build your comprehension.

To be totally honest, it’s nothing special. MosaSeries in particular is best if you want to practice building your listening comprehension with stories, but alternatives like StoryLearning and LingQ don’t quite do it for you.

You’ll quickly run out of these stories, but it can be helpful for nailing down how to use this particular strategy to learn a language.

MosaSpeak

MosaSpeak is more aptly named because its focus is on speaking the language. Though to be fair, a vast majority of this mini-course is texts upon texts upon texts explaining all sorts of aspects of speaking the language, not so much actually practicing.

To illustrate this concept, this lesson was several lessons into the first module. This is a legitimate approach called shadowing, but the app is so clunky it drove me bananas!

Trying to find the next lesson with active use of the language was so difficult because these courses aren’t the primary function of the app; to get here, you have to go more > Premium Courses > and then choose the course you’re working on.

With the amount of effort it takes to use a simple shadowing exercise that’s completely bookended by essays of text, I would just go to another app that does shadowing really well.

This isn’t to say that any of these strategies are wrong, but MosaSpeak is a mini-course, generally sold separately (hence the Premium), but it’s basically just a bunch of blog posts copied & pasted into an app.

MosaTraining

MosaLingua’s final major course, “MosaTraining”, is the priciest. Instead of focusing on one subject or one language skill, MosaTraining is more conceptual and teaches you “absolutely everything you need to know to successfully learn a new language”.

This is accomplished in 12 modules:

  1. Introduction and prep
  2. Immersion
  3. Improving listening comprehension
  4. Learning vocabulary quickly
  5. Improving pronunciation
  6. Learning how to learn
  1. Common mistakes and preparing for your first conversation
  2. Speaking
  3. Grammar
  4. Improving reading skills
  5. Improving written skills
  6. Continued language improvement

And just like MosaSpeak, it seems to be more of a book than anything else; in fact, I think MosaTraining would be easier to consume if it was a PDF, ebook, or audio book. Yeah, there are a few videos sprinkled in here and there, but it’s largely text-based.

While I agree with everything shared within MosaTraining’s lessons, I wouldn’t say it’s absolutely everything. Compared to The Method, MosaTraining lightly scratches the surface of some key elements of how to learn a language. You’ll get lots and lots of theory, but no execution of it.

MosaLingua Premium prices

MosaLingua is a paid service, and unfortunately the payment structure is just as complicated and clunky as the app and website.

I’ve mentioned quite a few different options in this MosaLingua review, and unfortunately they’re all separate payments. And between the monthly/biannual/annual/one-off payment options, it’s enough to go cross-eyed.

Here are the details:

  • MosaLingua Web: the all-in-one platform that hosts your vocab and whatnot: $4.99/month or $59.90/year; included for free if it’s necessary for another course you’ve purchased
  • MosaSeries: the audio series about a man who wakes up in the hospital with amnesia: $9.98/month or $58.80/six months
  • MosaSpeak: speaking practice recommended for levels A2-B2, and only available in Spanish, French, Italian, and German: $99
  • MosaTraining: teaches you how to learn a language quickly and efficiently, very conceptual: $130 for Premium, $180 for Premium+MosaWeb, $330 for Deluxe+MosaWeb

For the courses that do not come with that 15-day trial, MosaLingua does offer a 30-day money-back guarantee.

MosaLingua review and alternatives

I’ll be honest, this language app was not easy to review; I’m a tech-savvy millennial, and even I struggled to understand what I was supposed to be doing and where I was supposed to go. If ease-of-use is important for you, MosaLingua will not help you learn a language.

Regardless, MosaLingua does have its perks. My favorite is the Chrome extension, MosaDiscovery. This is a decently effective way to immerse yourself in the language while online, and save terms for later. I just wish the app to study said vocab terms was nicer, like Lingvist (much easier to use, and similar functionality).

I also like the concept behind MosaSpeak, though I wish there was more actual speaking practice than mountains and mountains of text. Pronunciation practice is important, though, even if I do prefer how Speechling and Fluent Forever actually accomplish it.

MosaSeries is also good idea, I just wish it were more fleshed out considering it’s a paid program. I wouldn’t be against starting out with MosaSeries, but eventually you may want to move on to something like Trancy or Kwiziq.

At the end of the day, I can absolutely see the value of MosaLingua web; it’s very well-priced and could be the exact thing that you need to connect to the language. Despite my qualms with how hard it is to maneuver, now that I *get it*, MosaLingua may be just what you need to learn a language.

Click here to try MosaLingua for yourself!

Lingopie Review: the best foreign language subtitles

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Lingopie is a platform created by and for language learners who enjoy learning foreign languages by watching TV. The idea behind this Lingopie review is that you’ll be so motivated to keep watching good shows, motivation will be easy peasy.

That said, how do you know if Lingopie is the right language learning resource for you? In this Lingopie review, we’ll discuss its benefits, limitations, and Lingopie alternatives.

Getting started watching foreign language TV

You can use Lingopie to learn 10 languages:

  • Chinese
  • English
  • French
  • German
  • Italian
  • Japanese
  • Korean
  • Portuguese
  • Russian
  • Spanish

Your Lingopie account grants you access to all 10 languages at any time. There’s no effort in switching languages either, which we’ll see in a second.

Lingopie review: watching and learning

You’ll see a Netflix-like page with all the shows Lingopie has to offer, separated by genre and, more importantly: every show and movie has an icon, front and center, of the country the media is from, which makes it easy to find the most relevant content for your language learning.

This dashboard/TV catalog is truly beautiful and genuinely motivating to start expanding into all sorts of languages. It’s easy to see that using Lingopie to learn a language requires minimal effort, especially if you’re in the habit of watching TV for hours on end once you’re hooked (guilty as charged).

I have one qualm about the search function: I like how you can search for different accents and genres (a la Yabla) but there is no option to search accents AND genre AND length, which is very basic functionality.

Because of this limited searchability, I stuck to Castilian Spanish content and chose something that looked interesting.

Roll over the show you want to watch to get a very brief synopsis of the plot, as well as how long that content is. The show I chose was only 3 minutes long, which surprised me. Usually we think of shows to be anywhere from 20 minutes to over an hour long, which can be overwhelming when it’s in a different language.

These short little clips are more like YouTube videos than anything else, if you don’t want to make the time commitment.

Before the show starts, you get a preview of the important vocab on the righthand side. While it’s labeled “Vocab for your level”, it’s mostly just an indication of the level that show is at – if you’re comfortable with these words, you’ll mostly understand the show.

For what it’s worth, that’s all you’ll need to know if you need to go up or down in difficulty. You don’t need to know all of the exact definitions of all of the words, nor do you need to know which context each word should be used, or all of its conjugations. These are the details that you’ll learn as you immerse yourself in the shows you’re watching.

Then, as soon as I pressed play, I got a “grammar coach” pop up. Judging by the answer I got, this is basic AI. Obviously with my first attempt the grammar is very simple, so I tried it again with a sentence with more complex grammar.

It’s not amazing, but it is a start. As of this latest update, AI is still pretty new so we’ll see how this develops. I hope that it’ll go from just naming the verb tenses (which is undoubtedly better than nothing) to explaining the concepts and/or linking to helpful content.

After clicking out of the grammar coach, here are Lingopie’s basic features in action.

Lingopie’s platform allows you to easily:

  • read the transcript while watching the show
  • translate any word or phrase in real time
  • listen to any word or phrase independently
  • save vocab to review later
  • practice shadowing (listening to native audio and repeating)
  • loop lines from the transcript
  • change the speed of the show
  • add/remove the native/target language subtitles

Lots of handy tools that are intuitively placed within the platform itself, and very aesthetically pleasing! These two features help Lingopie to stand out in the world of streaming foreign language content.

Reviewing vocab with Lingopie

After watching for some time, you’ll want to review the vocabulary you’ve collected. Lingopie offers a couple of ways to do this, all of which are slightly different and depend on your goals for any particular study session.

Let’s take a look at all 3 options.

Pop Quiz

The first type of vocab review is right within whatever you’re watching. Just click over to the “My Vocab” tab after collecting a few words and try the Pop Quiz.

This is a very simple way to connect the vocabulary you’re learning with the meaning in which you learned it – review the vocab with the exact video clip you found it in. This is a 10/10 execution of this concept, and blows the competition out of the water (looking at you, Trancy).

The pop quiz function is the easiest way to review a particular piece of media, especially right after seeing the terms for the first time. You don’t have all of your terms from all of your shows all in one quiz, so you can easily get this fresh vocab into your brain.

Flashcards

If you want to review all of your terms from all of your media in one study session, you’ll have to click over to the “Review & Practice” section.

Just like with the pop quiz, the flashcards section reviews your terms paired with their content. There’s slightly more functionality here though: click the card to flip between the word and its translation, and then tell Lingopie how well you know the term: know it, not sure, or no idea.

Lingopie also keeps track of your progress for you, including where you got the term, how many times you’ve reviewed it, when it was last seen, and the option to listen to it again or remove it from the list.

As you can see, if you want the actual native audio, it has to be in one of the features where the term is shown with the video clip. Otherwise, you’ll be listening to the robot recording.

Word Master

Lingopie’s third method for helping you review the vocabulary it teaches you is via Word Master. This vocab game is the only one that does not use the original video content to help you remember the words.

I’m not blown away by this option. The thing that makes Lingopie special is using the video content to connect the vocab words to their meaning.

If this featured another more active activity – typing in the words, for example – it might be more useful, but otherwise this isn’t much different from creating your own flashcards yourself.

Lingopie’s Chrome extension vs Language Reactor

While Language Reactor has essentially cornered the market for using Netflix to learn a language, Lingopie now has a similar Chrome extension that you can use with your normal Lingopie account.

With the Chrome extension you can see which Netflix shows Lingopie has translated for you, giving you that many more options to learn your target language.

As I said, this puts Lingopie in direct competition with Language Reactor, so let talk about some pros and cons, Lingopie vs Language Reactor.

Quantity of content

Language Reactor is a free Chrome extension that helps language learners use YouTube and Netflix to learn a language by pulling out the subtitles that already exist (most of which are automatically generated by YouTube) and make it easier for us to use them.

This means that Language Reactor’s content is essentially limitless; as long as there are new shows on Netflix and new videos on YouTube, there will be new content to learn a language.

Lingopie, however, is limited by the content they have available on their platform.

Quality of subtitles

Because Language Reactor tends to use automatically generated subtitles, they’re not always totally precise. And while this may not be a make-it-or-break-it kind of thing for many language learners, it can lead to confusion.

For example, it can be very difficult to recognize if it’s a particular vocab word that’s new, or if it’s a new phrase, or if it’s region-specific slang. This can require significant research that some language learners would rather not do.

Lingopie’s subtitles are not automatic. So if you want to just be told what a word or phrase means, there’s no competition.

Vocabulary review

As we’ve discussed in this Lingopie review, this platform makes it very easy and enjoyable to review the vocab you learn within its original context. You don’t have to do any other work, besides clicking over to a different section.

Language Reactor, however, takes some elbow grease. If you already have a flashcard system that you enjoy, like plugging new vocab words into Anki for example, then this may not be an issue. However, if you’re looking for a new approach for learning new vocab by watching videos, Lingopie makes all that much easier.

Lingopie review: pricing

Due to Lingopie’s high quality platform and subtitles, it is a paid resource. However, if the ease of use is what you need to learn a language consistently, then it is absolutely worth it. Plus, Lingopie offers a 7-day free trial to try everything out.

Click here for Lingopie’s updated pricing.

Lingopie review: alternatives

While I believe Lingopie is the most beautiful and user-friendly, it’s not the only way to learn a language by watching TV.

If you enjoy the curated content but want some more flexibility in how you’re studying the language, FluentU may be a good Lingopie alternative for you. As I mentioned, it’s not nearly as pretty as Lingopie, but what it lacks in design it makes up for in study strategy.

A similar alternative to both Lingopie and FluentU is Yabla. Again, not very pretty, but it can be fun to play around with.

Finally, if you’re willing to do some behind the scenes tech and macgyver your language learning just a little bit, Language Reactor paired with an Anki or Memrise deck is a budget-friendly alternative that could work just as well.

Should you use Lingopie to learn a language?

Lingopie is an excellent way to learn a language with TV and subtitles. In fact, it’s the best in the market in 2 ways:

  • teaching you new foreign language vocab with the context of video, and
  • providing top tier, easy-to-use subtitles.

Especially for that first bullet point, context is key when learning new vocabulary, so if you’re looking for a way to pair new vocab with a TV show you enjoy, I would recommend giving Lingopie a try.

However, it’s important to keep in mind that regardless of what they say, you do need to be at a certain level of listening comprehension to make the most out of a resource like Lingopie. Even in the beginner level video at the beginning of this Lingopie review, it uses intermediate-level grammar.

If you’re a total beginner, I’d recommend you start out with basic vocab first.

Want to use Lingopie’s 7-day free trial? Click here to get started.