There are three main reasons why I like Duolingo. It's free! It's easy! And, it's playful! Besides, you can learn languages at your own pace, whenever you want, as much as you want, and as long as you want, all around the clock 24/7/365.
The list of available languages you have there at your disposal is huge. Don't be surprised if, for instance, as a fan of Star Trek television series you would find even a Klingon language there either. π Another fantasy language you may see there also is High Valyrian.
However, the Duolingo project was started in 2009 by two selfless and genius guys, professor Luis von Ahn (creator of reCAPTCHA) and Severin Hacker who was the first cofounder. Later on, the project was additionally supported by investments received from Union Square Ventures and Ashton Kutcher's firm, A-Grade Investments, LLC.
At the end of 2011, they launched first online but the private beta version which almost instantly attracted many creating a waiting list of over 300,000 users. About a half year later, in the mid of 2012, the platform has been launched for the general public.
According to the reports published in The Business Journals two years ago, in the article from March 2016, Duolingo back then had over 120 million users. The number today exceeds more than 200 million users.
Six test levels scores might be achieved by learning languages with Duolingo, starting from Beginner through Elementary, Intermediate, Advanced, and Proficient up to the Expert level.
When you chose the language that you want to learn you would be offered with two options to choose your path. You may start as a beginner with Basics 1 or if you feel that you are a more advanced learner, you may take a short Placement Test which would unlock for you more advanced levels according to your current knowledge.
Image Source: Screenshot from Duolingo Desktop App.
Each Duolingo language learning level is divided into smaller lessons which are furthermore divided into different smaller skills lessons sort of mini-quizzes through which you would learn or improve your reading, writing, speaking, and listening skills.
Duolingo is genuinely fun and quite an addictive language learning platform where you can earn so-called Experience Points (XP) for correct answers, compare them and compete with other users. You may choose to race against the clock, set your daily goals and by accomplishing them earn so-called Lingots which you can use to buy some bonus skills lessons and other cool things inside Duolingo Store.
Not to be only a fun language learning app but as well to increase even more their learning efficiency, Duolingo recently added a new feature inside skills tree called Skills Levels. Skill Level points differ from XP (Experience Points). With each new Skill Level achieved you would level up and get harder and more in-depth exercises.
If you are contemplating to learn some new language and if the lack of time or otherwise attached expenses stopped you by now, I strongly encourage you to join big Duolingo language learning community and try this great tool!
Duolingo
Duolingo is accessible for free by signing in and using their online website as:
- Desktop version
- iOS App through Apple App Store
- Android App through Google Play
For those who want to skip the ads and be able to access the lessons offline, Duolingo also has a paid version called Duolingo Plus.
The languages that are currently available at their desktop web portal (in alphabetical order) are:
- Chinese
- Czech
- Danish
- Dutch
- Esperanto
- French
- German
- Greek
- Hebrew
- High Valyrian
- Hungarian
- Irish
- Italian
- Japanese
- Klingon
- Korean
- Norwegian
- Polish
- Portuguese
- Romanian
- Russian
- Spanish
- Swahili
- Swedish
- Turkish
- Ukrainian
- Vietnamese
- Welsh
Pick your language and enjoy learning it!
Join Duolingo Community!
Posted on Friday, April 27, 2018
Disclaimer
This is not a paid promotion, as well I'm not in any way affiliated with Duolingo, and I donβt get any kind of compensation by Duolingo for writing this article. The material provided in this article is general in nature; it's based on personal opinion and experience, and has been prepared for informational purposes only.
Images source:
All the images, if not otherwise stated, are from Duolingo Press Kit.
Bibliography:
Duolingo and Wikipedia - Duolingo
