Some people are natural-born language learners. Not me. Maybe, as I’ve been told, my problem is that I tell myself this narrative that I’m not good and then I underperform because of it. That makes sense. I’ve noticed the same thing with music learning in other people.

But that doesn’t change the fact that I feel like I’ve got an especially thick head when it comes to learning languages. I’ve used a ton of language learning apps, books, clubs, and formalized instruction in my adult years, and I’ve grown very picky about which ones are worth my time.

I’ve used Babbel a fair bit. Here’s what I think of it.

babbel at a glance

Babbel doesn’t have much of a shtick. It’s not gamified and humorous, like Duolingo. It’s not promising to “teach you like how a baby learns a language,” like Rosetta Stone, although from experience with that app I’d call that dubious. Babbel drives right down the center of the language learning app lane. It has written lessons that focus on grammar and pronunciation, just like you’d expect. Nothing flashy, but it works.

pros and cons

Pros

• Clear instruction
• 15-minute lessons are the sweet spot in length

Cons

• Only 13 languages
• Can’t go far with free lessons

how i tested

Because Babbel only has 13 languages and Swahili isn’t one of them, I approached Babbel from two directions. I fired up Spanish lessons, because I know Spanish passably well already, and I also fired up French lessons, because I’m a rank beginner.

This two-pronged approach gave me an idea as to how Babbel works when you’re entering a language with very little prior knowledge, as I suppose most people would, and also (through the Spanish side) gave me an idea of how well it actually does in instruction, idioms, and syntax, because I’ve had some real-world experience against which to judge it.

using babbel

There’s a mix of written lessons, in which you click the correct answer for the prompt, as well as audio, where you’re tasked to select what words you think you hear, and mock conversations in which you fill in the blanks, kind of like Duolingo.

Unlike Duolingo, though, Babbel is serious. Whereas the former teaches Swahili by talking about elephants trambling corn crops and Russian by having a motor-obsessed little girl constantly asking her grandmother about tractors, Babbel teaches like a phrase book. It’s less interesting than Duolingo but arguably more effective, thanks to the repetition. I wish Babbel explained more, though. You learn “¿Qué tal?” means “What’s up?” But it doesn’t break it down to tell you that Qué is the part that means what, or that it’s a very versatile and heavily used word in Spanish.

Once upon a time I had a 550-day daily streak with Duolingo, and I didn’t feel like I got much from it. The approach felt like to throw a bunch of vocab at the wall (you’re the wall) and see what sticks. Babbel is more structured, and so it felt like the lessons were building on each other in a way that I didn’t experience with Duolingo, not in Spanish, French, nor Russian. If you’ve been hammering away at Duolingo to no avail, give Babbel a try. It has the structure that Duolingo lacks.

At 15 minutes each, Babbel’s lessons feel just the right length. Pimsleur’s are 30 minutes, which can feel like a drag on a busy day. Duolingo’s are five minutes a pop, and they feel like they barely scratch the surface before they’re over. Babbel’s 15 minutes is just right.

Free Lessons Are Limited

Of all 13 languages, the first lesson in each is free. It gives you a way to dip your toes in the water to see if it’s right for you, I guess. But the initial lesson is so ludicrously elementary that anyone who half-absorbed Sesame Street in the background of their kid’s play date or remembers those elementary school language classes 30 years ago will recognize the same words and phrases. Think learning “adios” means “goodbye” in the Spanish course.

Realistically you’ll need to fork over money for a paid subscription to Babbel to get anywhere with a language. That’ll cost you $18 per month if you go month to month, but that drops to $9 per month if you sign up for a whole year. You can get a lifetime subscription for $300, but I don’t typically recommend that, because who knows if they’ll change the app for the worse before you get your money’s worth off it.

more language learning apps i recommend

I’m a big fan of Pimsleur. Even though the underlying lesson construction is fairly old—listen and repeat—rather than the gamification of Duolingo or the more deconstructed learning of Rosetta Stone, the effectiveness is real. No other app was as effective to me. The price is high, though, at $21 per month. You get 51 languages, though, including some unique ones. I got halfway decent at Swahili thanks to Pimsleur. You have to buckle down for its 30-minute lessons, but if you value effectiveness over flashiness, then it’s the best of the bunch.

Read my Pimsleur review to learn more.

The app iTalki is a different beast. Rather than consisting of language lessons, it acts as a matchmaking service to pair you with real humans with whom you can practice your language. A common pairing is that you teach your native language to somebody else who teaches you theirs. Say a native English speaker in Chicago is learning Moroccan Arabic, so they talk to a woman in Casablanca who’s learning English. You can also find professional language instructors to teach you over scheduled video chats.

The platform can be very hit or miss, though, since you’re dealing with real people. I’ve had conversations with people who turned into lifelong friends, and others who were duds. Same with the instructors. They set their own rates, but for the most part I found them fair. It was just that like in-person instructors, some were a good fit and others weren’t.

forget apps! just move to (BLank) Country.

Yeah, I hear this one a lot. I’ve heard it all my life, some version of “No book/course/club/app can teach you a language entirely. You need to move to the country and immerse yourself in the language. That’s the only way to do it.” I’ve sometimes rolled my eyes so hard that I swear I could feel the Earth itself rock. Not everyone wants to learn French badly enough to move to Marseille, nor are most people privileged enough to have the means or ability to uproot their lives to learn a language.

The rest of us normal folk have to make do with what we can, and that’s often apps. Dissecting song lyrics, watching movies and TV shows in your target language, and joining language practice Meetups are all excellent ways to further your language learning once you have a decent base-level knowledge. In my experience, I’ve floundered when I’ve approached those without a decent understanding and some basic vocab, at least. Start with apps, and once you consider yourself an intermediate learner, start mixing in those things.

how much should I practice?

One thing I’ve learned, initially with musical instruments, is that it’s better to have frequent and regular practice for short amounts of time than to have irregular long bouts of practice. I’m sure some very clever people could explain why, talking all about brain construction and using the term “plasticky,” but I’ll just say that one 15-minute lesson per day with Babbel is plenty, especially if you can commit to doing it every day. Try to stay consistent.

the bottom line

There’s nothing sexy or quirky about Babbel. Rosetta Stone has its “learn like a baby” shtick, Memrise builds all its learning around videos as if you’re talking to real people, and Duolingo is a big, flashy game with an adorable mascot and a wry, amusing sense of humor.

But you don’t need any of that. Pimsleur is similarly sober and serious, and it’s one of my favorite language learning apps. If you’re just dipping your toe into language learning apps, Babbel’s approach will be familiar to the school courses and language instruction books you’re used to, only a bit more interactive because, well, it’s an app. Even though I didn’t find it as effective as Pimsleur’s mostly audio-based instruction, Babbel is perhaps better for more visual learners—and those who like to plug away at their language learning when cranking up the volume isn’t realistic.