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Ling Review: make language learning light and flexible

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Ling is a fun, cute language learning app that believes in making language learning (something inherently difficult) easy. It was originally created to satisfy a lack of resources available for learners of Southeast Asian languages, and today it’s been expanded to include over 60 languages of various popularities.

So how do you decide if Ling is right for you? In this Ling review, we’ll talk about what Ling does well, what it doesn’t, how to know if you should use Ling to learn a language, and Ling alternatives.

Languages you can learn with Ling

The Ling app boasts a frankly huge number and variety of languages offered! You can use Ling to learn:

  • Afrikaans
  • Albanian
  • Amharic
  • Arabic
  • Armenian
  • Bengali
  • Bosnian
  • Bulgarian
  • Burmese
  • Cantonese
  • Catalan
  • Chinese
  • Croatian
  • Czech
  • Danish
  • Dutch
  • English
  • Estonian
  • Finnish
  • French
  • Georgian
  • German
  • Greek
  • Gujurati
  • Hebrew
  • Hindi
  • Hungarian
  • Indonesian
  • Irish
  • Italian
  • Japanese
  • Kannada
  • Khmer
  • Korean
  • Lao
  • Latvian
  • Lithuanian
  • Malayalam
  • Malaysian
  • Marathi
  • Mongolian
  • Nepali
  • Norwegian
  • Pashto
  • Persian
  • Polish
  • Portuguese
  • Punjabi
  • Romanian
  • Russian
  • Serbian
  • Slovak
  • Slovenian
  • Spanish
  • Swahili
  • Swedish
  • Tagalog
  • Tamil
  • Telugu
  • Thai
  • Turkish
  • Ukrainian
  • Urdu
  • Vietnamese
  • Yoruba

As you can see, this collection of languages puts Ling on par with apps that support literally dozens of languages (apps like Mondly and Glossika come to mind). And just like those other apps, supporting 60+ languages means keeping their content pretty surface-level.

But we’ll talk about that more as we continue with this Ling review.

Ling review: getting started

Your Ling subscription grants you access to all 60+ languages, and you can access any of them at any level at any time. Here’s what that looks like.

Whenever you want to switch languages, just tap the flag in the upper left-hand corner and either scroll the list or type into the search box.

And no need to bother with any “checkpoints” or anything – attempt whichever lessons you want at any time. I love this freedom and flexibility; language learning does benefit from a certain level of structure, but I find myself easily unmotivated when an app forces me to study things I don’t want to learn.

So far, Ling is super easy to play around with and use!

Let’s take a look at the very first lesson of the very first section, built for total and complete beginners (I assume – there’s actually no mention of the intended skill level anywhere on the website or the app itself).

This is a curious approach, and there are a couple of reasons why.

Gamification

If the likes of Duolingo have taught us anything in the past several years, it’s that keeping language apps fun keeps language learners coming back. Bright colors, round and easy-to-read designs, and fun sound effects make people feel good.

It’s not nearly as annoying as Duolingo can be, but if you’ve been burned hard enough by Duolingo before, this might turn you off.

You can even see at the end of the above video where the app forces me to set a goal streak. Your opinion of this level of gamification already says a lot about how much you will or will not enjoy using Ling to learn a language.

That said, if gamification is something you need to keep you hooked (no judgment here) Ling might be a great option.

Implicit grammar lessons

Also just like Duolingo, Ling is teaching grammar implicitly, which means you’re led to figure it out as you go without being intentionally taught anything about rules or how the language works as a whole.

This can be seen as a more “natural” way to learn a language, but it can also be frustrating to try to piece the language together without being told how to. It’s a spectrum – how much you need to learn the rulebook, and how much you just need to try it – and every language learner is different.

If you want to use Ling to learn a new language that you have no experience with and is not related to any other language you know, it’s important to understand you will likely need to do some Googling to try to understand some things.

In this way, Ling can be used as more of a general path to be informed about what to learn next. There’s a direction here, but the vehicle you used to take it is completely up to you,

Translating vs “knowing”

One more thing that can make or break a language app for any particular learner is how you’re learning to connect to the meaning of new vocab words.

The best example of learning to understand meaning is Rosetta Stone – there’s no translation happening there, you’re just connecting new words to images that can be described with the new vocab word.

On the other hand, there are various levels of connecting new foreign language vocab to words in your native language, which leaves you translating back and forth between languages all the time.

Ling places you somewhere in the middle: you’re connecting new vocab to its translation, but the text is small, you’re always hearing the word, and you get a picture too. That’s not a bad compromise, in my opinion.

Even more important, though, is that Ling gets you to use the new vocabulary immediately.

Ling review: speaking practice

Ling’s approach to learning languages includes their dedication to the four language skills. An all too common problem is these fun, gamified language apps doing absolutely nothing to get language learners to speak the language. Tapping buttons is easy, but it only gets you so far.

Let’s see how Ling approaches this problem.

Voice recognition, the most common method for language apps to accomplish this, is mostly to motivate you to try. Even in the above video, you can see the voice recognition not being too sure.

It gets the job done, it’s fine.

Honestly, the point is that language learners are led to start. It’s often so hard for people to practice speaking their target language just because after months or years of learning, they’ve never actually tried to speak.

Ling also has chatbot conversations, which are basic pre-made conversations where you just repeat your side of the chat (and try to keep up). Again, it’s meant mostly to get you started speaking, not mastering it.

I wanted to like Ling’s chatbot more…but I couldn’t. I just got annoyed.

If it didn’t recognize my pronunciation, fine. But the message telling you that the chatbot doesn’t understand you over and over and over again is rage-inducing!

That, and listening to the app repeat what I just said after I said it, made me never want to use Ling’s chatbot again.

Hopefully, you have a different experience than I did (voice recognition and chatbots often vary significantly across devices), but I have to be honest.

On the bright side, I am a big fan of the ability to turn off the translations in this section, as well as the push to practice speaking in a safe, controlled environment (this feature cannot be overstated here).

Ling review: difficulty level

In the languages I’ve seen, Ling offers lessons labeled from total beginner to expert. Given how many languages the app supports, I was skeptical, so I took a look at the most advanced Spanish lesson.

Definitely not expert-level vocab.

The grammar is at a more intermediate level, but keep in mind that there are no explicit grammar lessons, so you either need to be very very good at picking up patterns, or you need to find your grammar information elsewhere.

That said, do not expect Ling to get you to advanced (and definitely not expert) levels within your target language. That’s not what it’s been created to do, even if they named their levels a bit too optimistically.

Ling review: pricing

Ling is a paid-only app, with payment structures varying from monthly to annually to lifetime. Only the annual plan includes a 7-day free trial.

I do believe that the quality of the Ling app reflects its price point, especially with how many languages you can learn at any time.

The biggest thing to keep in mind here: no ads (and no changes to try to pressure you into paying more money – what you see is what you get).

Click here for updated pricing.

Should you use Ling to learn a language?

Ling is a great way to learn a new language, but not for everyone.

I’m a fan of the focus on all 4 language skills; even if it doesn’t get you past beginner levels, it’s a good habit to start with such a well-rounded approach. The app is also easy on the eyes and easy to maneuver.

But my favorite part about Ling is that it’s a light path to learning a new language, without having to pass checkpoints or worry about losing so many hearts you can’t learn anymore.

If you want something similar to Ling, read about LingoDeer.

However, Ling will not teach you things beyond the surface level. You will not learn any grammar, or intermediate/advanced vocabulary. If you’re looking for that pathway with a bit more detail, some Ling alternatives include LanguagePod101 or Rocket Languages.

Want to give it a shot? Click here to try Ling.

Rosetta Stone review: for beginner language learners only

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Rosetta Stone has been a major name in the language learning world longer than most. This Rosetta Stone review will help you decide if it’s the language app for you.

Can you really get fluent using Rosetta Stone? Is it worth the money? Should you be considering it? In this Rosetta Stone review, I’ll touch base on all these questions, so you can make an educated decision on whether to take the plunge.

First things first, though, is to make sure Rosetta Stone actually teaches the language you’re interested in learning. Rosetta Stone offers the following languages:

  • Arabic
  • Chinese (Mandarin)
  • Dutch
  • English (American)
  • English (British)
  • Farsi (Persian)
  • French
  • German
  • Greek
  • Hebrew
  • Hindi
  • Irish
  • Italian
  • Japanese
  • Korean
  • Latin
  • Polish
  • Portuguese (Brazil)
  • Russian
  • Spanish (Latin America)
  • Spanish (Spain)
  • Swedish
  • Tagalog
  • Turkish
  • Vietnamese

Rosetta Stone review: what works

First off, let’s talk about how exactly Rosetta Stone accomplishes what it says it will accomplish. I’m very particular about making sure I’m practicing all of my language skills and knowing exactly what my goal is with any language.

That being said, how does Rosetta Stone work, and what does it teach you?

The closest thing to immersion

Rosetta Stone’s claim to fame is that it teaches you the language by immersion, which is great! And it’s true – you will never see or hear a single English word using this program. Using Rosetta Stone as an ultimate beginner is great because you’re learning to think using the language right off the bat; compared to other programs, where you’re translating between languages in order to learn, this is undoubtedly the best way to take in a language.

And Rosetta Stone is great for this very reason: it makes you think. With every round of questions, the way it’s designed forces you to actually think in the language. This is the first step in learning a new language authentically and efficiently.

So, if you’re starting out with the language fresh and new, the Rosetta Stone method is incredibly challenging, but in the best way.

The lessons may not go by as quickly and painlessly as Duolingo’s 5-minute lessons – you’ll spend a significant amount of time really using your brain, just like you would in real-life immersion. In fact, I had to take a break after the first 2 lessons because my brain hurt like it does when I’m in actual language exchanges!

Multiple-choice questions that you can’t fake

Another thing about Rosetta Stone that I really love is that you can’t really BS it. The program depends heavily on multiple-choice questions, but they switch it up. For example, you’re given a phrase, and then you’re given 4 pictures – your job is to match the phrase to the correct picture.

Once you’ve done that, not only is the text taken off the picture (so you still have four images to choose from for the next phrase), but the order of the pictures is flipped around. It’s just another level at which you actually have to think, as opposed to “well I’ve already matched up 3 pictures, so I don’t even have to look at the last phrase to know which picture it belongs to”.

It’s a simple thing, but it really makes a world of difference when it comes to making you actually think in the language, which, again, is one of the most important parts of effectively learning a new language.

Speaking from the beginning

Another thing that Rosetta Stone does really well is making you speak from day one. At the beginning levels, this is really helpful, as a lot of newbie language learners don’t realize that getting used to forming the words correctly is a skill in itself.

Foreign languages use different sounds, and just recognizing them by ear isn’t enough – you need to build muscle memory, and Rosetta Stone helps with that.

Rosetta Stone makes very large claims about speech recognition. I personally tend to take this with a grain of salt, because this isn’t the first time I’ve heard that, and it’s usually pretty useless. Most of the time, speech recognition is either easy to fake or says you’re wrong even when you’re right.

In my experience…Rosetta Stone’s speech recognition is about 50/50, as well. In some ways it has alerted me to how I’m pronouncing incorrectly, but whether or not it’s been a convenient fluke…who knows. I say that because after saying the same word with the same exact pronunciation four times and being told it was wrong the first three and right the fourth…it’s still not 100%.

So, take what it tells you with a grain of salt. Listen carefully, and absolutely practice your speaking, but I feel like there are better ways to go about that one.

…and all the other language skills

Yes, speaking is the big thing that most newbie language learners might avoid. Besides speaking, Rosetta Stone is surprisingly good at hitting the other language skills: reading, writing, and listening. Once you get through your core lesson, where you’ll learn all the things you need to learn about that unit, you’re also taken through lessons for each individual skill, which is amazing.

You get all of your language skills, appropriate to your level of learning, right in one go. Honestly, no other independent language learning resource does that, so in this way, Rosetta Stone is way ahead of the game (and has been for more than 20 years now).

That being said, this is a big deal. From the very very beginning, you get in the habit of practicing the language in every way necessary. Pretty good for beginners!

Rosetta Stone review: what doesn’t work

Now that I’m done raving on and on about how wonderful Rosetta Stone is, let’s talk about its failings. Now, keep in mind that it’s not that this program does things wrong necessarily – Rosetta Stone knows who its target audience is, and if these faults are a big deal, it’s not meant for you anyway.

I say this because I’ve seen plenty of reviews talking about how Rosetta Stone is heavily flawed, but so is every other language learning resource. Nothing is one-size-fits-all; if it were, there wouldn’t be a reason for all of these products. Know what you’re looking for in your language learning journey, and that will help you to make the right choice.

It’s repetitive

Right off the bat, Rosetta Stone can get infuriatingly repetitive. If you’re used to learning languages, and it’s easy for you to grasp linguistic patterns, Rosetta Stone is horribly boring and slow. The most basic words and grammatical patterns don’t need to be drilled so incessantly for learners who have already learned these same exact patterns in other languages.

If you’re an ultra-newbie this is great, because you’ll learn the basics and you’ll learn them well. However, if you’ve already done the legwork to recognize and be familiar with these basic patterns, you’re gonna get real bored real quick, which means you’ll give up.

Even with more advanced-level content, this was too slow. I tried to go into the settings real quick to speed it up, but no-go.

Rosetta Stone will provide you with a great base level to build on, which is great if you need it. If you don’t need it, don’t bother with it.

It’s basic

Rosetta Stone has 5 units of lessons for languages that are related to English, but only 3 or 4 for other unrelated languages. There is a lot of content, and the content is very thoroughly broken down into all of the language skills. It involves a lot of drilling and a lot of basic hand-holding.

However, the amount of drilling and hand-holding involved means that the content doesn’t get you very far. If you’re planning a trip abroad and want to feel comfortable understanding and communicating at a basic level, it’s very thorough and efficient. However, you won’t get much farther than that. And if you’re a seasoned language learner, you’re gonna get bored real quick, even if you’re still learning things.

You will not be learning intermediate or advanced words or concepts with Rosetta Stone. If you’re just starting out with the language, you’ll be fine, but there is no real building on the basics using this program. You’ll get a very solid root to the language, and you’ll be at a good place to push onward, but you can’t get onward depending solely on this program.

It’s expensive

This has been a major sore spot for Rosetta Stone since the beginning. Especially since the internet became a thing, and a variety of cheap or even free resources have become available, the steep price tag (think $200 for a single-level CD-set!) has turned a lot of people off.

As time has gone on, Rosetta Stone’s prices have become a bit more palatable by switching to a monthly model like a majority of the industry. The caveat is that you cannot invest month-by-month. You can see current prices here.

Fortunately, they do offer a 30-day guarantee.

Rosetta Stone review: stories

With stories, you get 3 different options for practice: read the story, read and listen, or read and read aloud. These stories are very on-level, and offer you another resource to practice both input and output.

I’m a big fan of listening to text while you read it, plus highlighting each individual word as it’s read? Two thumbs up!

When reading aloud with the story, the concept is exactly the same – the highlight tries to follow along with you word-by-word. It’s not exactly 100%, but it does the job enough.

Use this tool to listen to how you’re pronouncing the words, and then switch back to listening to compare.

My only complaint here is that I wish you had the option to download your recording. That way you could send it to a tutor or language exchange partner for feedback, or even just keep track of your progress for yourself.

Rosetta Stone’s audio companion

Then we have the audio companion. With each lesson, Rosetta Stone offers audio tracks of vocab pronounced correctly and slowly, with a beat after each word for you to repeat.

On mobile, you have the option to rewind, pause, and fast-forward; on desktop (as pictured), you just get the audio tracks downloaded straight to your device. In this case, it’s up to you to have a program that offers these options.

This first lesson had 18 audio clips (including the intro), by the way, not just the 3 shown here.

Rosetta Stone review: is it for you?

Rosetta Stone is a great language learning program that satisfies every language skill (that in itself is hard to come by), meaning you don’t have to look elsewhere for practice. If you’re a total beginner looking for a very confident base in the language, click here to get started with Rosetta Stone.

However, if you’re not a beginner or find the pace to be much too slow, I’d skip it. Instead, I’d recommend these comparisons if you’re interested in something similar:

Babbel vs Rosetta Stone: how to choose

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The conversation of Babbel vs Rosetta Stone depends completely on what kind of language learner you are, and how far you want to go with your language.

Rosetta Stone, for example, is great for ultimate beginner learners who just want to get to tourist-level understanding, while Babbel is for much more intensive learners.

But, if that doesn’t answer the question of Babbel vs Rosetta Stone for you, let’s go into detail. Both resources are genuinely high quality and very useful, but neither is for every single type of language learner.

Babbel vs Rosetta Stone: languages

First things first, which language(s) are you interested in learning? Both Babbel and Rosetta Stone teach:

  • Dutch
  • English
  • French
  • German
  • Italian
  • Polish
  • Portuguese (Brazilian)
  • Russian
  • Spanish
  • Swedish
  • Turkish

Rosetta Stone also covers:

  • Arabic
  • Chinese
  • Tagalog
  • Greek
  • Hebrew
  • Hindi
  • Irish
  • Japanese
  • Korean
  • Latin
  • Farsi
  • Vietnamese

And Babbel has:

  • Danish
  • Indonesian
  • Norwegian

Babbel vs Rosetta Stone: lesson format

Both languages apps are structured very similarly…but there are key differences.

For example, Rosetta Stone is much more simple. It’s designed for the simplest goals: tourist level of the language. The lessons are static, and you know exactly what you’re going to get. You’ll also be consistently drilled several times over.

This is excellent for beginner language learners without any experience who need to get used to repetition, but boring for those with experience.

Babbel, on the other hand, is more responsive to your answers. If you keep getting something wrong, it’ll bring it up again and again until you get it. Plus, the content is going to go much more advanced, considering it’s built to be more textbook-like.

Babbel leads you through significantly less repetition than Rosetta Stone. Babbel does it SRS (Spaced Repetition) style, where you see more difficult terms more often; Rosetta Stone has a set number of repetitions for you to get through in every lesson.

If you try Rosetta Stone, you’ll learn very quickly if the repetition is too much for you, or if it’s exactly what you need.

From here, it’s pretty evident that Rosetta Stone and Babbel come from very different beginnings: Rosetta Stone being 3-figure-investment CD sets, Babbel being one of the first language learning apps.

Babbel vs Rosetta Stone: levels

As mentioned, Rosetta Stone is only going to get you so far. Babbel will get you…well, farther than that.

The first sign: Babbel asks you to assess your current level. And interestingly enough, the whole thing is in English!

On the other hand, Rosetta Stone doesn’t attempt to assess your level at all. Instead, it presents you with the lessons available and lets you choose the one that you think matches up with your current skill level. This approach is ideal for complete beginners.

Rosetta Stone’s static lessons follow the subject-verb-noun sentence structure all the way through its advanced content. It is engaging and well-rounded and helps you learn to use the language in more than one way, but it still maintains the same, identical patterns regardless of content.

This isn’t a problem if you just want to use the language to communicate simply, maybe for an upcoming trip or something. More experienced learners, however, will get bored quickly.

Rosetta Stone will get you speaking and understanding fast because of its real-life content; Babbel builds your skills over the long term because they’re being built to be more flexible, and useful in a variety of contexts (reading books, watching TV, etc.).

This isn’t to say Babbel doesn’t provide a real-life education, though, but we’ll talk about that later.

Language learning journeys: Rosetta Stone vs Babbel

One of the most important things to keep in mind is where your language learning app is going. It is worth noting here that the exact content from language to language isn’t going to necessarily match.

Like with any other language app, more popular foreign languages are going to be more developed. It’s a simple supply/demand thing. Regardless, here’s how the Spanish courses compare.

Babbel does offer support for more niche interests than Rosetta Stone, at least with languages as popular as Spanish.

However, Rosetta Stone, again, drills its lessons thoroughly. This leaves less room for the fun stuff or other needs you may have.

Speaking practice

If being able to speak your target language is important to you, it’s just as important to choose a language app that will support that goal. So when it comes to learning to speak, how do Babbel and Rosetta Stone compare?

While Rosetta Stone was offering live coaching for a minute, I’m guessing it never really took. At the time of this review, Rosetta Stone is limited to the tech in their app.

On the other hand, Babbel’s coaching system, Babbel Live, seems to be going strong! Basically, every month you can join a certain number of small group classes (limited to 6 participants) with a Babbel teacher where you can get real-life conversational practice.

*Note that a Babbel Live subscription is separate from the Babbel app, but if you pay for Babbel Live, you get the app thrown in free. The Babbel app is priced similarly to the Rosetta Stone app.

Which is your next language app?

While both Rosetta Stone and Babbel are pretty huge language learning apps and are insanely well-known within the language learning industry, they’re actually quite different from each other and serve wildly different needs.

Rosetta Stone is simple. It’ll get you to basic conversations pretty quickly, and will drill you again and again until the lessons truly sink into your long-term memory. And even if you want to eventually go into more intermediate content, Rosetta Stone is still a high quality start.

Babbel is more flexible. It follows your lead and gives you only the information that you need when you need it. Plus, the skills you learn from Babbel can be easily applied to any language learning goals you may have.

Made your choice?

If Rosetta Stone sounds more like your speed, you can learn more about it in my Rosetta Stone review or click here to get started.

Alternatively, if Babbel makes more sense, you can find my Babbel review right here, or click here to try the app.

Clozemaster review: customizable, engaging, and simple

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Clozemaster is a retro-themed website & app with a huge collection of sentences for intermediate+ language students to practice their vocabulary and grammar. These sentences are grouped into tons of categories, with the option for users to create their own categories, so the sky is the limit with this Clozemaster review.

In this Clozemaster review, you’ll learn where Clozemaster shines, its flaws, and whether Clozemaster is best for your language learning needs. And, if it’s not, keep reading for the Clozemaster alternative for you.

Clozemaster review: languages

While Clozemaster is not for beginners, it is for learners of a ton of languages:

  • Afrikaans
  • Amharic
  • Arabic
  • Armenian
  • Basque
  • Belarusian
  • Breton
  • Bulgarian
  • Cantonese
  • Catalan
  • Chinese (Mandarin)
  • Chinese (Mandarin)(Traditional)
  • Croatian
  • Czech
  • Danish
  • Dutch
  • Esperanto
  • Estonian
  • Filipino (Tagalog)
  • Finnish
  • French
  • Galician
  • Georgian
  • German
  • Greek
  • Guaraní
  • Hebrew
  • Hindi
  • Hungarian
  • Icelandic
  • Indonesian
  • Irish
  • Italian
  • Japanese
  • Kazakh
  • Korean
  • Latin
  • Latvian
  • Lithuanian
  • Macedonian
  • Norwegian (Bokmål)
  • Occitan
  • Persian (Farsi)
  • Piedmontese
  • Polish
  • Portuguese
  • Romanian
  • Russian
  • Scottish Gaelic
  • Serbian
  • Slovak
  • Slovenian
  • Spanish
  • Swedish
  • Turkish
  • Ukrainian
  • Vietnamese
  • Welsh
  • Yiddish

Because Clozemaster sources their sentences from an external website (more on that later), it is clearly accessible to a huge variety of foreign languages.

It is worth noting, however, that the options and opportunities are not equal across all languages. After deciding if Clozemater is a language learning app that you’re interested in using, you’ll then need to take a look at your target language and see the variety of content you’ll have to work with.

But what is Clozemaster?

The name “Clozemaster” wasn’t created out of thin air; if you’re not familiar with “clozes”, they’re a type of activity that’s very common in language learning, basically a fill-in-the-blank deal. Specifically, a “cloze” is defined by them as:

Of, relating to, or being a test of reading comprehension that involves having the person being tested supply words that have been systematically deleted from a text.

Thus, Clozemaster is the master of clozes.

It’s worth mentioning that Clozemaster isn’t the only resource that offers clozes, but clozes are all that Clozemaster offers. And I do have to say, Clozemaster is absolutely the master when it comes to learning a language online with clozes.

Clozemaster review: a walk-through

After creating an account on Clozemaster and selecting a few different options, you’re spat out onto the dashboard. It’s a retro-themed view (with retro sounds, too) that adds a touch more fun to the process, since you feel like it’s more of a game than anything else.

At first glance, Clozemaster isn’t very user-friendly. You’re presented with a ton of different options without any obvious indication as to which option to take or what you’re supposed to do. It’s a little bit better than LingQ’s lack of usability, but it can still take a minute to get your bearings.

Across all languages, you get some form of “beginner” content, like:

  • Most Common Words
  • Fluency Fast Track
  • Cloze-Collections

The third one is your own collection of sentences.

You would think that these would be beginner-friendly, but they are definitely not! Clozemaster requires at least an intermediate understanding of the language, and it’ll be abundantly clear if your language skills are up to snuff the second you try using Clozemaster.

While those “beginner” collections are free for all, premium subscribers also get Grammar Challenges, which are collections of sentences that are meant to help you master traditionally difficult grammatical concepts. These are different in every language, as every language has different grammar concepts.

But again, the concept is simple: fill-in-the-blank sentences.

Depending on the language, you also get a few settings to decide how you want to play:

  • vocabulary
  • listening
  • speaking

Not all languages feature all skills, so make sure you take a look at your target language before you commit. For example, audio recordings are only available in a fraction of these languages. Expect them in more commonly learned languages, not-so-much in others.

You can also choose how many sentences you’re shown per round: 5-∞ (yes, the site really says that). Then, either multiple choice or text input. Choose text to really challenge yourself! You’ll also earn 2x the points.

If I’m already at an intermediate level in a language (or at any point, personally), I prefer to manually type in the answer. This helps cement words and conjugations into your brain, as you’re forcing yourself to spell correctly as opposed to going off a general idea of what the correct word looks like.

This is the difference between vaguely recognizing a word and truly learning it.

I also love that Clozemaster holds you accountable for appropriate accents (including offering the letters if you don’t have your keyboard set up for that yet), and encourages you to try, one letter at a time. That can make the difference between making an educated guess and just giving up.

Clozemaster also approaches languages less from an academic standpoint and more from a colloquial one. In the lesson above, you learn phrases that are actually used every day in Spanish, and not necessarily the ones you’ll learn in a textbook.

And then, at the end of all that, you’ll level up with a super fun GIF. Doesn’t quite match up with the retro theme, but I’m willing to let it slide 😉

Creating flashcards with Clozemaster

Clozemaster’s premade collections can do a lot of good (my favorite being the grammar stuff), but some language learners may have specific goals, or find these general and unpredictable collections boring.

No worries – using the Clozemaster system, you can create all the collections you want! You can either create them manually, or you can search through already-created cloze sentences and organize them as you like.

When using these options, it is totally possible to use Clozemaster for beginner content; however, it does take some extra work and is probably not great if you’re not a seasoned language learner.

Experienced language learner starting a new language? Sure. New language learner just trying to figure everything out? Not ideal.

Speaking of options, you also get the freedom to dictate how you’re learning the language every single time you press play. These settings take Clozemaster’s sentences and create entirely different exercises based just on the skills you want to practice.

(Again, not all languages will necessarily have all these options.)

How Clozemaster gets its sentences

Clozemaster has access to so many sentences because they’re sourced straight from Tatoeba.org, which is an open collection of sentences and translations. Anybody can hop onto the website, search for a word, and find sentences to give their words some context.

While it is an amazing use of an open-source website, it has limitations.

For one, it’s not unusual to get sentences like these.

No need to read too into it – they’re just sentences that someone in the world uploaded in Spanish/English, and maybe they’ll pop up as you study. At any time, you also have the option to remove these sentences from your collections.

Besides that, Clozemaster provides not only sentences with a single cloze, but you can also use it for a whole passage!

This is an option to vary up your studies and keep you on your toes, as well as throw some reading comprehension into the mix.

Okay, clearly it’s not perfect, but it is an option. Once you apply the right settings, this could be great for reading comprehension and finding new vocabulary, which you can easily add to any cloze collection at any time.

Clozemaster review: should you go pro?

Let’s talk about becoming a Clozemaster subscriber. Certain aspects of Clozemaster are always free, i.e. the “Fluency Fast Track” and all the reading practice.

Honestly, though, Clozemaster Pro opens up a ton of doors when it comes to both reading and listening practice.

Pro subscribers get access to all of these lessons, both as reading and listening, all as fill-in-the-blank, contextual questions. It’s a lot of simple yet very useful content and considering Clozemaster themselves don’t “create” anything per se, Clozemaster Pro is very reasonably priced: $8 a month, and even cheaper as an annual subscription.

Honestly, if Clozemaster is something that keeps your interests and matches your language goals, I’d spring for Pro. For $8/month, you’ll get a step more of a holistic language education. If you enjoy Clozemaster free, I’d recommend Clozemaster Pro for pretty much any kind of language learner and their goals.

Clozemaster review: who’s it for?

Clozemaster is an excellent resource for intermediate-advanced level learners looking to build their vocabulary and drill some of the more difficult grammar concepts they face. It’s also excellent for language learners looking for more context in general: just search for a term and Clozemaster will bring you all the sentences you need from Tatoeba for you to create a collection.

Easy as pie.

However, beginner language learners should definitely be looking elsewhere, maybe at something like Lingvist (a bit more pricey, but provides similar context) or maybe Anki (much less user-friendly, but great for clozes).

If you need more direct, clear-cut grammar lessons, go somewhere else (maybe Busuu or Babbel?), because Clozemaster assumes that you know the basic idea of these concepts, and you only need practice and repetition.

Or, if you’d rather apply clozes to texts you’re already reading, VocabBoost may be for you.

That said, repetition is important for any language learner, and Clozemaster is an excellent option!

Drops Review: beautiful vocab for beginners

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Drops is a popular language app, known for its beautiful design and quick wins. It’s similar to Duolingo in that it’s fun, easy, and addictive, but with more of a focus on expanding your vocabulary than building your grammar. Recently, Drops has also been bought out by Kahoot! to create an insanely fun resource. This Drops review will tell you more.

Read on to see whether Drops is the right language app for you.

Drops languages

You can use the Drops to learn a ton of languages:

  • Ainu
  • Arabic
  • Bosnian
  • Cantonese
  • Chinese (Mandarin)
  • Croatian
  • Danish
  • Dutch
  • English (American)
  • English (British)
  • Esperanto
  • Estonian
  • Filipino (Tagalog)
  • Finnish
  • French
  • German
  • Greek
  • Hawaiian
  • Hebrew
  • Hindi
  • Hungarian
  • Icelandic
  • Igbo
  • Indonesian
  • Irish
  • Italian
  • Japanese
  • Korean
  • Maori
  • Norwegian
  • Persian
  • Polish
  • Portuguese (Brazilian)
  • Portuguese (European)
  • Romanian
  • Russian
  • Samoan
  • Sanksrit (for yoga)
  • Serbian
  • Spanish (Castilian)
  • Spanish (Mexican)
  • Swahili
  • Swedish
  • Thai
  • Turkish
  • Ukrainian
  • Vietnamese
  • Yoruba
  • Pride

Drops clearly supports a variety of languages (and a handful of accents), and they’re adding to that list all the time. When a language app supports so many languages, it’s generally safe to assume that the content won’t get too advanced; that said, Drops is best for beginners of the appropriate.

Not only that, but Drops also offers this content through source languages other than English, making it a great option for laddering languages (i.e. learning a third language through a second language). This is a more and more common feature, and can be found in other resources like Mondly, Duolingo, and Glossika.

Drops review: the Drops approach to vocab

When you first log in to Drops, you’ll be recommended to start from the very beginning of the language. This first lesson will give you some simple vocab, and get you used to the Drops style.

Some features of this strategy that you can see:

  • when you’re presented with a new word, you’re asked if you want to learn it (whether you already know it, or if it’s an important term for you)
  • you’ll see the image Drops assigns that term to
  • this term + its imagery will be repeated a few times to get that short term memory going

I love this because you’ll never be led to translate your vocabulary (except the first time you see it)! This not only prevents the bad habit of having to translate words before you communicate but also opens up this strategy to any native language.

As you build more and more vocab, you’re led to differentiate between vocab words through the exact imagery.

And, as you prove you’re learning the terms with more and more correct answers, Drops ups the ante by making its questions just a little more difficult.

And that’s it. Drops keeps it simple. Very, very simple.

Drops review: what you’ll learn

First, you’re introduced to new words with relevant icons, and you tell Drops whether or not you want to learn this word. This is a nice way to not waste your time learning words that either you already know, or they’re so easy that you don’t have to spend the time studying them (if they’re close enough to English, for example).

You’ll get the English translation when the word first appears, but after that, tap the icons to see what vocab word you’re supposed to be translating. I like how this makes an effort to help you avoid the habit of translation and jumps right into just thinking in the new language, the thing that Rosetta Stone really rocks at!

Plus, you get the added bonus of hearing the word/phrase being said every time you review them. Very helpful for getting new vocab cemented in your brain and exercising your listening skills.

From the start, you can see where Drops really shines: vocab. While you can use Drops to take in your very first words, it also offers vocab to cover a ton of subjects:

  • Basics
  • Food
  • Travel
  • Relationships
  • Work
  • Home
  • Education
  • Hobbies
  • Outdoors
  • Wellness
  • Shops

That adds up to 11 different subjects’ worth of vocab, all of which you can access in over 30 different languages. There are no “levels” or “checkpoints” to meet before you can learn any of this vocab, so choose your own path!

Drops app review: review features

Learning new words is only part of the battle – the other part is review. Fortunately, Drops offers a few different options to review this new vocab. First off: quiz mode.

In this section, Drops helps you by tying the vocab to its meaning. This is unique, and adds some more context to your terms. Drops understands that context and meaning are incredibly important to learning foreign language vocab, and they’re helping you do just that.

Just unlock the vocab to get through 5 quiz questions, and play away!

There’s also Review Dojo, which you can access after you learn 45 new terms, through this review just seems to be regular Drops focused on previously learned terms.

Drops Premium

Drops is a free language app, up to 5 minutes to practice a day. If you wanto study for more than 5 minutes a day, you can opt for Premium. Click here for updated pricing.

Besides unlimited study reps, a premium Drops subscription also gives you access to their other, lesser-known language apps, Scripts and Droplets

Drops’ other language learning apps

Allow this Drops review to introduce you to Scripts and Droplets. Both are similar language apps to Drops.

First, Scripts. With Scripts, you can learn to read and write the alphabets of other languages using Drops’ fun colors and sound effects. Scripts can help you with the following alphabets:

  • American Sign Language
  • Chinese Hanzi
  • English alphabet
  • Hebrew

  • Hindi Devanagari
  • Japanese Kana
  • Korean Hangul
  • Russian Cyrillic
  • Sanskrit (for yoga)

Droplets, on the other hand, is very aptly named – it’s Drops for kids. It’s pretty perfect, actually; what kid doesn’t want to learn a new language by “playing with their words”?

Drops review: who should try it

Drops is a super fun, uniquely beautiful language app that helps to keep language learning accessible by offering not only a whole bunch of languages for one price but also two whole other apps. If you’re looking for a highly entertaining way to add a bit of vocab to your language learning strategy, I’d give it a shot.

However, if you want something with a bit more oomph – like building up to sentences and/or throwing some grammar in the mix – I’d recommend an app like Lingvist or Mango Languages.

Or, if you need a fun way to learn vocab but want some more wiggle room when it comes to the categories or types of vocab, maybe try an app like LingQ or Chrome extension like Language Reactor.

Either way, Drops is an excellent start for beginners of its supported languages. It’s gorgeous, works well, and keeps it fun.

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.