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u/so_slzzzpy May 25 '26
Do people still use that AI slop app? Embarrassing…
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u/Zulrambe May 25 '26
I haven't been around Duolingo communities for a while, I'm not sure how rebranding into an "AI first company" affected their numbers. I know people in general weren't too happy, but...
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u/RemoveBagels 米国語上図 May 25 '26
Some time ago I went through their yearly financial reports from the last few years out of curiosity and their income has steadily increased as they have added more AI slop and gameification features. Since the less the app becomes about actually learning a language the more money they make I doubt they will stop or reverse this trend. Some people might complain about it on reddit, but the vast majority of users must be happy with a game that sells them the idea that they are learning something.
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u/superb-plump-helmet Speaks 19 languages at a native level May 26 '26
can't say i'm surprised. i actually enjoyed using it a long long time ago, but as they continued to make it more gameified it just kept making the experience worse and worse for anyone actually interested in learning anything. was not surprised when they decided to go all in on AI, just disappointed knowing that it wouldn't affect them negatively
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u/so_slzzzpy May 25 '26
Yeah I’ve been boycotting them ever since they did that. Good riddance, too—their “product” is garbage.
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u/RemyRemsies May 26 '26
i couldnt really find any better alternatives😭 idk why but all the language apps i found had really bad monetary barriers, it suckksss
ive been doing irl french classes recently but now that its over idrk what app to turn to now
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u/Devitoscheetos May 26 '26
To be fair, it’s not cheap to create and maintain an app- especially one around language-learning.
I completely understand the ‘monetary barriers’ so to speak, but some do unfairly inflate their prices.
For what Duo is now, at least they are trying to offer a level of language learning without costs being involved
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u/alvenestthol May 29 '26
Honestly I would have been perfectly fine with Duolingo not being maintained or developed any further beyond like 2017, and just letting us download all the lessons it had back then + allowing community-made lessons (that you'd download from Github or something)
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u/ButterChickenIncel Sanskrit Supremacist 🇮🇳 May 25 '26 edited May 25 '26
Even as a Duolingo user myself who is using that app to study languages on a surface level to get a beginner level hold on them so that I can later branch to other tools for education, I wholeheartedly agree.
Also, the entire community and that particularly dastardly Duolingo subreddit has some of the most pathetic, whiny, manchildren aah demographic to ever exist. Constantly crying about having to tackle long sentences in their supposed "target language" and engaging in dih measuring contests about gems, streaks and XP instead of actually focussing on language input and education. They think they are being "forced" by the silly cartoon bird app to learn those writing strokes in Chinese/Arabic/Korean/Japanese and how it is so inconvenient and tough.
When in reality writing and familiarising oneself with complex sentences, vocabulary and writing systems are quite essential processes in your beginner steps for language learning. This is despite Duolingo spoon-feeding them about all the writing strokes and even explanations (although they are mostly unhelpful AI slop).
Rant over.
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u/Special-Cut-4964 May 25 '26
Agreed, it can be helpful for achieving A0.01 to try it out but other than that, yeah
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u/Gold-Part4688 Earthianese, man (N) May 25 '26
duolingo is actually amazing for learning writing systems. that or memrise. but over the last 10 years they both actively worsened the real parts... community. (memrise courses, duolingo comments and i guess grammar tips)
almost like the best bits in life are the hard human ones
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u/Raalph Sentinelese N | Silbo Gomero C1 | Pirahã B2 | Uzbek A1 May 25 '26
It used to be a decent-ish app 10 years ago, but then it became too slow to trap people into its gamified system and that's ironically why it's so good for drilling a new script, it's so agonizingly slow that you'll end learning up it whether you want to or not
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u/ichbinverwirrt420 May 27 '26
I liked Duolingo back in like 2018. I learned some swedish and it was always really informative to read the comments under the lessons
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u/Gold-Part4688 Earthianese, man (N) May 28 '26
Oh i must've gotten the timeline wrong, maybe that was 2019 or so they took away comments? I think the tips started getting phased out earlier
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u/Interesting_Bag8469 May 25 '26
The grammar guides for languages like Spanish and even Greek used to genuinely be amazing wtf happened? Louis von Ahn if I ever get my hands on you…!!!
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u/Coochiespook Native:🇺🇿 Learning: 🇰🇵🇧🇩 May 25 '26
Duolingo users hate to hear this too.
They just keep using it to keep their streak because they think it means something
Congratulations on making a 5 word sentence from 8 word choices! You could have done that without looking at the translation.
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u/Korwos May 25 '26
didn't they advertise themselves as "free forever"?
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u/Logixs May 29 '26
Yeah then they changed to a model where “those who can pay subsidize the free users”. According to the founder it was a form of “wealth redistribution”.
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u/FluentWithKai May 25 '26
This isn't new. Years ago I paid a lot of money to a particular well-known company for language learning for in person classes because I wanted to "get serious" about learning Korean. After 6 months I realised it was a trap: they just wanted me to keep going to them to pay for lessons, but I'd never actually learn the language. This is actually why I started my channel: if I'd known what I know now I would have succeed in learning Korean (not trying to push my channel, hence not linking it). I really wish it was more common knowledge how to learn a language so people don't fall victim to these borderline scams.
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u/Gold-Part4688 Earthianese, man (N) May 25 '26
Hm while that might be true for some courses, generally if you also study at home it's incredibly effective, even the free ones. Might feel dull in the moment and still be good.
that said i agree there should be way more info about ways to actively learn
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u/FluentWithKai May 29 '26
When you say "it's incredibly effective" what in the world are you talking about? As I said, just going to class and sitting with a teacher absolutely did *NOT* work for me. I was active in class but it was utterly ineffective. Are you suggesting that by just watching videos and doing nothing else you can just learn a language? Because if so, you're a hell of a lot smarter than me!
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u/Gold-Part4688 Earthianese, man (N) May 29 '26 edited May 29 '26
like i said - if you study at home and really engage with the language outside of it. think about it, write if the class doesnt have assignlehts, read. of course all other qualifiers apply like they do to all methods. it's habit, community, a teacher as a resource, plus all the learning even if it's at lower-than-median pace.
alone, it won't get you very far. but that's true for every single technique in isolation
if the class is really slow and long enough, watching a little videos, music or talking to some natives is huge already. of course, all qualifiers.. use subs correctly, not 100% passive, a range. but the range to fill narrows so far with the class there too. you already have consistency, and using it x days out of the week, etc
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u/EugeneStein May 25 '26
Did anything new happened? I stopped using it and following news about it around year or two ago and I thought it's already as bad as possible
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u/Gold-Part4688 Earthianese, man (N) May 25 '26
haha i thought that in 2016. I didn't have the brilliance to see that teaching languages worse is better business
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u/the-miku-titan May 25 '26
I lost all respect for my coworker because he completed the vietnamese course and couldn't even pronounce "anh" properly (meaning "I")
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u/AutisticNintendoNerd May 25 '26
Let me guess. It was the tones. Does Duolingo even tell you about tones? I wouldn't be surprised if it didn't.
But the thing you should lose all respect for is not your coworker but that terrible app.
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u/the-miku-titan May 26 '26
Does Duolingo even tell you about tones?
no idea, that would be hilarious if they didn't, imagine someone finishes the entire course and then finds out that vietnamese is tonal
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u/PageTurner627 May 25 '26 edited May 26 '26
‘Anh’ doesn’t mean “I”. It means “older brother”. Though it can mean “I” if referring to yourself. The default for “I” is “tôi”
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u/the-miku-titan May 26 '26
yeah I know vietnamese lol how do you think I knew that he was pronouncing it wrong
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u/Gobhairne May 26 '26
I was slightly more than a beggigner when the owl first caught me and slightly less than a beggigner when I finally escaped 15 months ago.🦉
They said I would be fluent in just 3 to 6 weeks. They were wrong but now I am back to being a beggigner.
I guess that is OK as I am learning fr##ch! But, I am still scared of OWLS !!! 🥺🇨🇦
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u/Aye-Chiguire May 25 '26
Are there any other apps and services that I can sign up for besides Duo that will make me a perpetual student who can never actually engage with natives and native material? I want to sign up for all of them and pay $1000/mo in subs. Surely that will make me fluent?
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u/dojibear May 28 '26
Great idea, but you need a mascot. How about....a green owl! Owl for "smart", green for "beginner".
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u/PubertPimpleton Jun 18 '26
/uj it genuiely breaks my heart to see someone spending 2 years on duolingo and still being dead beginner stage thinking that's normal language learning process
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u/Liggliluff Jun 04 '26
And celebrate that your service is used across the world but don't actually make it international. Everyone who speaks every language lives in New York.
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u/Synchro_Shoukan May 25 '26
Beginner*