Best Language Learning Apps for Your Phone

Getting to lingo with the locals is the most important thing to me when I travel. So, finding the top language learning and best travel apps before I travel to a country has become more and more important over the years.

I bet travelling the world years ago when English wasn’t such a common language made for a much more exciting journey. Sadly, nowadays, we seem to have become a bit lazy. If people don’t understand, often people will just try to say it louder and slower and throw in a few hand signals, with the hope it helps. However, learning a few basics is relatively easy these days with so many free language apps to help.

Travelling through Dieng in Indonesia, where no one spoke English to me for a good part of the trip, was challenging. I was able to get by with my Indonesian basics. But as the traveller in me has grown, so has my want to study other languages. Luckily, there are heaps of awesome language apps to help us these days. Keep scrolling to see my favourite best language learning apps.

Also, you might want to check out my recent article on learning Spanish online, which will give you some further ideas on language learning resources.

Not sure what’s on the menu? Use your phone camera to translate it. Need to get a sentence out to a local that you really don’t know? Let it speak it aloud for you. Literally, the best language app to help communicate in any situation.

No, really, stay with me here. As this is such a simple yet clever solution to combine learning a language with something fun which already fits into our spare time. Lingopie doesn’t just bring subtitles to 1000s of hours of TV shows and movies, but the subtitles are clickable. This means that you can pause the show and learn the meaning of any new words while you are watching – you will also be learning the pronunciation from the audio track of the programme. At the end of each episode, you can review the words you clicked on to recap what you have just learned. 

This is especially great for increasing your word knowledge. Particularly helpful whether you’re a beginner looking to learn new words or more advanced with a grasp of grammar but simply want to expand your vocabulary. With nine different languages to choose from – Spanish, French, German, Italian, Russian, Brazilian Portuguese, Japanese, Korean and English – it’s a beneficial app for those who wish to travel or live in a country that speaks any of these languages. Give the free trial version a go. If you enjoy it, you can continue with the yearly membership, costing around €6 per month. Cheaper than Netflix!

Drops is a relatively new language app. My favourite thing about it is the different mediums it supports in learning words. You get both written and audio words, but also visual graphics to help support the learning. This is ideal if, like me, you are more of a visual learner. You also have complete control over the words that you go through this process with. So if you are already confident with certain words, you can tick them off, and they won’t show up in the lesson format.

I have been using the premium paid version of Drops, as I’m quite committed to learning Portugues. So far, it seems worth the investment. I certainly am learning full sentences rather than just words, which is awesome. Hopefully, it will have laid down enough of the basics when I start my in-person language classes so I can come in at a higher level. Lessons can be digested in as little as five minutes. Another thing I love about Drops is their commitment to lesser-known languages and preserving traditional and regional dialects as they expand.

Why so good? I like the fact it is more like a course in the palm of your hand than a list of jumbled words. It uses repetition and reviewing to make sure you have grasped it and mixes audio learning with visual prompts. As someone with Dyslexia and a Visual Sequencing problem, I find all these mixed learning methods really useful.

You aren’t going to become fluent here, but you will have more than enough to get by. They also have a fairly wide range of languages. For Spanish, in particular, it is one of the best language learning apps as it has a very extensive course.

I like the fact that it does cross over from the phone to the web. You can start and finish the modules, too. It is well structured, and the lessons are pretty thorough. However, given the monthly cost, once you have picked up the basics from another app, it might be better to invest that money in Skype lessons with a local.

The bonus of this app for me is that I am awful at pronunciation. And as well as asking how to say certain things, you can record your voice to get feedback as to whether what you are saying sounds like the real deal. Hello no more embarrassing moments in shops of talking complete gibberish, you can keep your blushing behind the phone screen!

It does have a subscription fee for premium access. And the downside of it is that only those who have paid for it can listen to your voice recordings, so you are reliant on someone who has! Certainly, one of the best language learning apps if you want to engage in actual conversation.

While it isn’t that cheap, given you have an online teacher, it’s a great option for people who might not have a language school nearby where they live. You can opt for group or private lessons, and it works on a credit system – the more credits you buy in bulk, the cheaper the classes become.

What I really liked about the platform and the teachers was the flexibility. It’s split into the formal levels such as A1, A2 etc., and there are plenty of the same classes to choose from over different days and times, so you aren’t locked into a specific class slot as you might be with a language school, so you have more control. I also loved how the teacher provided the written notes and annotated coursework from each lesson afterwards as a PDF download, so you can keep a copy of what you are learning and working on. 

You can enjoy free group or one-to-one lessons during the trial, so it’s well worth giving Lingoda a try to see if it will support you with learning Spanish online. In addition to the paid classes, the actual class learning material resources and programmes are freely accessible at any time. You can get started with a free trial here.

My favourite method? Ashamedly it is watching English films abroad and learning from the subtitles, which also usually leads to comical soaps and knowing all the words to a foreign catchy crap advert with no idea what they are talking about. Can you get any more cultured than that?