Mixed Reviews for Duolingo: Users Praise Utility while Criticizing Bugs and Repetition

I've been using the app for over 4 years. I like a lot of things about it. however the farther you go in the language the more...particular the answers need to be. not because you're wrong, but the algorithm doesn't recognize other ways of saying the same thing. and the voices are still pretty robotic and not very natural which makes it hard to differentiate some words and sounds.

Love the steps Duolingo has taken over the last few years to gamify language learning even more. I really wish they hadn't switched to the linear, single trail thing as it makes it harder to bounce around depending on my mood. Therefore, if I'm at something difficult, I just don't progress until I'm in the mood for a challenge. I'm sure a lot of thought went into the change, I just don't understand what it is because for me and my wife, it just makes it harder to want to study.

I've been using Duolingo now for about a year and a half learning Mandarin Chinese. Overall, it is a very good learning app that progresses well and is structured slightly game like that makes it challenging and fun to use. Good balance of speaking, listening, and memorisation lessons. Would be nice to have a vocabulary section to practice words (or characters in my case). Also, an option to redo a speaking lesson. I get cut off often when speaking before I'm finished. Again, good app overall!

Used to really like duolingo but now I thoroughly dislike it. The app is awful. it's flakey, often cutting out completely at the end of a lesson and you have to end it and start the app again. It's difficult to find what you want. It often shows it as a mistake when it was perfectly correct, it just hadn't said what particular past tense it wanted. It's very difficult to progress without spending money on hearts etc. It's all about trying to get you to pay now. Very, very frustrating.

I think it's great! the main issues I have are not much: the microphone doesn't actually capture what I'm saying in Gàidhlig so I can't use it, and sometimes the listening segments are near impossible from how hard it is to discern the words being said. Other than that, the only issue left I have is that the phone app won't let me see how much EXP I gained during my time on it, so I need to keep closing the app and opening it back up to check on the leaderboards.

I don't have the super version (which has monthly payments), and I've studied two languages for a longer time, while trying out other languages on the side. Duolingo works perfectly without needing to pay. The ads are basically non-existant, lessons are uninterrupted, and basically the only difference between super and the normal version is that you don't have the practice hub. Definitely recommend for anyone wanting to learn any language!

This app is amazing for learning languages for the first time. Has beautiful animation and exercises for all necessary. Not just a dictionary! But it repeats the same things for a long time and that's quite annoying. You can skip the whole pack of lessons, but in the other you can miss them. It's the perfect beginning of my language study way. I have Duolingo and don't need dozens of exercise or grammar books. - I don't have the Premium version and still it is the best app.

The short lessons are great, can fit into busy days. Hearts take way too long to regenerate. I love that I can click the words and see the translation. The mix of writing, reading, speaking is great and keeps its entertaining. I also like the mix of voices and speeds all the time, and the turtle button to slow down speech. Level up is so expensive on the free version. I enjoy this a lot for learning Spanish - ¡Muy bien!

I enjoy that this is a free and pretty immersive app. I'm just disappointed on the update because now I have no idea how to continue writing in my Duolingo notebook. I think the option of inviting and following friends is encouraging. learning is smooth. Not sure what happened to stories on the mobile app, but I can't find them anywhere after the updates. I do love Duolingo as I've been using it for over a year and a half. I wish there was a speaking feature though. that's super important!

Very slow progress in Spanish lessons, very repetitive. I used to love stories when I started Duolingo 4 years ago. Now these stories are for toddlers not adult learners. They use one basic stories 20 times to revise basic words. I know those stories word by word now and I don't mean it in a good way. I have been at Spanish for years now and I don't feel I am making progress. AI doesn't recognize my knowledge level. These are the reasons I don't want to buy super duolingo, despite constant ads.

duolingo is a great app for learning new languages! the best among of all i tried. though, it still can improve, i think. for example, it would be really helpful to have a dictionary of already learned words and phrases. when you come back to your course after a long time it is a big pain to complete lessons because you forgot almost everything. besides that, i think it would be better to make leagues optional. they dont help much, more like stress you out because you cant study at your own pace

It's so handy using your phone to study and practice as it's always with you. The lessons are easy to grasp (Spanish for me). It's well laid out as each following lesson has a bit of the previous lesson. There's a practice option to recap on your previous mistakes. Lessons are adaptable on your environment so if you are on a train you can opt out of the questions where you are required to speak or listen. Note: Even the paid version has options to pay for other bits. That's disappointing.

It's fun, and works!! im doing my french gcse and I've gone from one of the worst in the class to being one of the best, so thank you :) my only problem would be that If I go off the app (like pressing the home button) It'll close the app, and i lose my progress from my lesson. I'm not sure if a bug or intentional, but it can be tedious if I need to answer a message, for example. but overall, it works pretty well, and im going to continue using 😋

Love the app, tremendously helpful to learn a language and increase vocabulary. Note- I miss the previous format of Duolingo, I could have gone to the story page and could practice the same story or other several times. It was more interesting also. Well, I can see with this new format, the idea is for people not to skip ahead and do full practice.

Since the entire system was overhauled, I haven't been able to progress learning. It's exhausting to scroll through the lists, XP boosts are harder to plan for and I often can't use them because I don't have the time, and the additional animations make loading lessons take ten times longer than they used to. Many steps backwards. I went from loving Duo to dreading everytime I need to open it. I only do what I need to maintain, I'm not progressing and I miss how it used to be. Major bummer.

Fun little quizzes. But I wouldn't call them "lessons". There is no instruction teaching words or grammar before the quizzes. There will be a new word and you initially have to guess the meaning and see if it's correct. No tutorials on sentence structure, or for some languages, the different words used depending on masculine or feminine. Some of the spoken parts are very fast and difficult to hear properly. It is fun and good for learning some basics.

The app used to be good. Nowadays it's very buggy. Lessons take minutes to load, even switching between tabs takes almost 2 min sometimes, the sound on some of the lessons don't play when you tap the button and sometimes it just throws away progress that you make. It also has become more expensive to take the leaderboard challenges. It used to be 10 gems and now it's 30. It's all a push to get you to buy super. Very disappointed in how the team is running the app. They don't listen to feedback.

This used to be a positive learning tool, unfortunately that has drastically changed, now it forces you into leagues where your only way of moving up is to buy the unlimited package. I've been on this app for almost 4 years and I've watched it go from a good learning aid (useful while also doing proper classes) to a generic quiz game with a scoreboard. Don't waste your time.

I used to love the app, but different courses are of vastly different quality. One course (in beta) I've been working away at for years doesn't seem to be maintained. I've sent the same correction for inaccurate English translations repeatedly, and it's never been fixed. When I check the now defunct blog, others had the same correction years ago. They just don't care to fix it. The app is losing its shine, unfortunately.

Easy to use, great for a free app. Lots of opportunities to practice what you've covered. I find the speech recognition a bit hit and miss which can be frustrating when it doesn't recognise something I know I've said correctly. You have to be careful of word order in translations if you're a native English speaker. Lately, July 2023, the app stops responding almost every time I use it and fails to complete lessons. Almost unusable now.

Duolingo was always a bit glitchy, but until recently I could live with it. It was a quick and simple way to refresh my language skills. Recently, though, it has become almost unusable. Lessons take forever to load, the app keeps crashing, I keep getting thrown out of lessons, sometimes when I'm halfway through them. And the content itself just seems to get more and more inane. It really has become a joyless experience using this app, quite frankly. I don't think I can bear to use it anymore.

I have a real "love/hate" relationship with this app. Some of the lessons are really fun and useful. My German skills have improved a lot. However, the timed challenges can often be infuriatingly short, to the point where there bordering on impossible without using a timer boost, but the app doesn't reward you with enough gems to actually buy timer boosts as frequently as they're needed. Also, if you don't upgrade to "Super", the constant ads pestering you to upgrade are very intrusive.

Very intuitive and flashly courses and quizes. Might be a bit repetitive at some points, though. UPDATE: After using it for a few months now, I'm absolutely disappointed by the app's overall stability and lagging which I experience in every day usage. Sometimes it hangs up and the voice recognition is also not well-optimized. Big letdown as I've cross tested it with both types (Wi-Fi & cellular) and multiple networks. Big letdown after promising first impression in the end!

Love this app. The notifications can be a bit much, like 20 times a day but it's not too bad. Not sure if the £9.99 a month is worth it but it definitely gives you an advantage. Problems: it takes so long to load sometimes that a lot of time is used up loading when you have a 15 minute XP boost! It's so annoying to know that half of my time is used up waiting when you are on a time limit. The app crashes so often I have to close it then open it again. It's pretty annoying tbh.

The structure is brilliant for learning languages but there is something wrong with the app itself. I don't know if it's the latest update (or needs one!) but it's now constantly crashing on me, not loading lessons or even more annoyingly - I spend the time doing a lesson and it doesn't register that it's complete!! If that gets fixed, it would be perfect!