LingQ: Real Language Learning Reviews

by Brookiecookie606

I’ve been learning Swedish for a few months now through a combination of Duolingo and trying find other materials on my own, like listening to Swedish music and radio stations and watching movies. It seems everything has been improving but my listening comprehension, so I figured I’d try out this “this app” app I hear Steve Kaufman advertising in his podcast all the time. I knew there was a subscription feature, but I thought there’d be more you could do without it. I didn’t even get through a single lesson before I’d reached my this app limit. Now that I’ve reached this limit, I cannot use LingQ anymore because it won’t let you advance to the next page of a lesson without making at least one this app on the current page. I’m sure it’s a great app and could help me improve more than I ever could with Duolingo, but it’s just not going to work for me.

by Beesbees12

I am really bummed out because I was really hoping this would live up to the hype. I’m learning French and have be using Duolingo, which I’ve been pretty happy with, because you can learn a lot for free. But I wanted to try this more immersive approach, studying current news articles and such. I love this idea...and I think it could be massively helpful. But why don’t you guys stop advertising this as a free app with purchases available to improve the experience. I can’t do anything with LingQ unless I pay for it. I couldn’t even get through a single beginner lesson. I saw another reviewer complain that he was getting spam regarding his progress. Yeah, it’s a notification. But it feels kind of spammy when the notification is reminding you to do something that you can’t do unless you pay to do it. I realize you gotta make money, but this just feels kind of icky of you guys. I have no idea how useful LingQ is because I’m not going to pay to figure it out. The interface was kind of confusing, too. I’d hit the play button and it wouldn’t match up with the text. It was weird and frustrating. I don’t want to watch a bunch of videos to learn how to use an app. I’ll look up news articles and use a pocket translator to learn my way through it. Seriously bummed out.

by Reviewer7531

The system, with its highlighted words, is great. 5 stars.
The feed needs fixed, it's just a bunch of random articles. I can't find my own uploaded content half the time, even under Imports, without searching specifically by name. 4 stars.
The forums are toxic - there's a 85% male ratio on there, I'd estimate. Questioners are a mix of internationals, and "bros" who use their words-learned as a way to measure themselves. I thought the forums had a bit of toxicity to them, then I got straight up attacked by someone I had never talked to. Another time, spam was posted in a forum, and I called the person out on it, and a group swarm came after me. They also accused me of "group think" while they swarmed, without ideas/original thoughts backing up their opinions, just insults. The spam they posted had a gender-dynamic to it; trying to convert men (and men only).
I don't know if Steve's looked at the user data, or even cares, but I'd bet he's pushing away women users from his site. I'm someone comfortable swinging it with the guys, and dang, do I not want to be on those forums. Within 7 days of starting my membership, I was being bullied [and by someone who thought I was a man, since he called me a "little boy."] The fact that very few women ever speak on the forums is an extra sign that this app has cultivated a bad chat culture that is (likely) driving away female potential users.

by Whitefox3457

I’ve seen many reviews like this, and many of them have developer responses stating that you can complete as many lessons as you want without having to pay, while this is technically true, the lessons are practically useless if you can’t click on unknown word to get the translation! I completed one lesson and it was great, albeit a little easy since I’ve been trying to learn Japanese Hiragana for a about a year now, but then on the second lesson I went to tap a new word to learn the translation, and it said I needed premium to do that! So I struggled through the lesson by guessing, but I will be deleting it after this. I don’t usually get upset when language apps aren’t free, most of them aren’t, but LingQ continuously advertises itself as a completely free app, when in reality, you cant complete lessons without either guessing and not learning anything, or paying. If your willing to pay, great! This is an amazing app for you and I’m sure it will be super easy for you to learn with this, however, if your like me and either don’t have the money, not willing to give money for this, or maybe your a minor, then this is not LingQ for you.

by Brian Lynn Ii

This is my first review I’m writing for an application, I have wanted to write this for a while now as I’ve used this app for almost a year, anyway this app is the best tool to use for an input based approach on language learning, which is by far the best way to learn a language, using this app you read various texts and listen to many different materials, and even within the free version you have access to a multitude of resources for all levels of language learning. The premium version is a must have as it keeps track of the vocabulary you learn, making it extremely easy to keep track of progress and choose material based on your level. The only problem I’ve ran into is with more advanced and upper intermediate level vocabulary, as the translations are entirely user dependent, but still it’s such a minor issue. My other problem lies in how this app often has trouble reading Arabic script, it often counts 1 word as two words, or you’ll see the same word as different words. (Still a very minor issue) all in all, if you are looking to brush up on your second language or are an aspiring polyglot, LingQ is a must.

by Lee In Utah

I loved LingQ when I first got it. Among other things, it gave me easy access to a wide variety of material to help keep language learning fun and easy. A couple of months ago they updated to version 5, and the problems began. I could no longer change word definitions to match the context, I had several problems with the daily LinQs, the trash can button would come up darkened, not letting me remove things, the X button to get out of things would stop working, etc. It just got to the point where I was spending more time fighting with the program and texting customer service than I was studying the context. Unfortunately, the end of my subscription is coming in a few weeks, and I don’t want to spend another year fighting with LingQ. I have other materials that I use each day as well, so for now I’ll stick with those and I’ll try the free version in another 6 months or so, to see if they’ve got all the bugs out. When everything is working right again I’ll probably resubscribe, but right now it’s just frustrating me, and demotivating my desire to continue in this area of my language studies..

by MarsDancer15

I absolutely love that this app tracks words I have learned and highlights ones I don't know or are working on. This utterly transforms my reading (and vocabulary learning) experience. In the past I have tracked new words by hand, on paper, using a dictionary, but this makes reading slow-going and frustrating. Being able to click and bring up candidate definitions, and select or enter my own, is a wonderful advance. I have been pleased with the content available and the ability to import new content. I am also exploring the audio side and working to spend more time listening. I look forward to exploring more of the options like submitting my own writing or working with a tutor. So far I am really pleased with both the website and LingQ ! Nice work!

by ZBen Ctarik

LingQ has helped me have breakthroughs in a few languages, and I recommend it to anybody who I think is interested, and sometimes to people who aren't too. Only real problem for me is the lack of content in some languages (which is inevitable and totally possible to work around, especially given the import tool) and the fact that Genius imports (which I use a lot) don't format well in LingQ . The Genius convention is to use line breaks instead of periods or commas to separate lyrics, but when they're imported, it's as one massive unpunctuated block of text, which especially in languages without capital letters (mostly Hebrew in my case) is pretty hard to read.

by BrentMurrell

If you’re a bookworm, you’re going to love LingQ. It’s super easy to find free ebooks online, download them, upload to LingQ and you’re off to the races. It keeps track of all the words and phrases you’ve learned and are working on and automagically turns them into flash cards - but I barely even use that feature because by reading you’re exposed to words in an order that makes sense - the more you see it the sooner you learn it. Thus prevents you from wasting tine on words and phrases that are uncommon - ESPECIALLY if you’re reading books based on your interests. This might not be the fastest way to reach fluency but if you’re going to read anyway, why not make it in your target language?

by BomTrady631

I learned Spanish up to an intermediate level over the past two years. I just found out about LingQ while trying to learn Japanese and I wish I knew about LingQ from the start of my language learning journey. It’s so much easier to learn through context and reading along especially when LingQ keeps track of the words you know and the words you are still learning. It doesn’t over complicate things trying to guess what level with each word you’re at. You simply do it yourself. I’ve only just begun using LingQ but I can tell that it’s great for learning languages. I’ve been uploading my own songs that I’d like to learn and it’s working very well so far.

by Dale2185

Like many of you, I gave this app a try after slow progress becoming truly conversational in foreign languages from other methods. I had heard great things and wanted to give it a try.

WOW, IT REALLY WORKS!!! Truly truly the best way by far to learn languages, and it is now just crazy to me that people would learn languages any other way. This is THE WAY for most people to learn languages and it’s actually enjoyable. I want to spread the word and let other people see the light / take advantage.

HOWEVER, as a technologist, it baffles me why the implementation is so clunky. From the user-experience, to the features being designed more for developers than language learners (e.g., manually adding foreign words is extremely user unfriendly), to the inconsistent cross-device experience, ..... LingQ feels at least 5 years out of date if not more.

I really with they would become a modern user-experience (to be honest....you could learn a lot from DuoLingo here) and this will make it so so much easier for others to take advantage of this truly better way to learn languages.

We love you guys! Make it easier for us to work with you!

by Coffeepuff

Love LingQ. Due to copyright issues, there is a relatively limited amount of free reading, BUT LingQ is amazing because I can Import Spanish text (like Harry Potter or random websites in Spanish) and it lets you get immediate feedback on words you don’t know. The accompanied oral pronunciation has helped a lot with my pronunciation. I only regret it took me so long to realize you can change the talking voice from Spain accent to Mexican/Standard accent (which is how I learned).

I do, however, remain very confused at the amount of people that have trouble “cancelling” their free trial if they don’t want it. In your phone just go to settings, name/Apple ID/media, subscriptions, this app, and cancel or change your subscription 🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️

by Czeska

Imagine a deck of flashcards with magical powers and you have this app, which I have been using for about two years now, growing my Italian vocabulary to over 13,000 words. I can use it both on my Mac computer and my iPhone. I looked at other similar services but none of them came close to the thorough, imaginative way that this app works. There are lots of materials to read for whatever level you’re on—or you can enter your own texts. Reading and listening, you mark the words you don’t know and forget the rest. The marked words then pop up in your daily reviews until you mark them as learned.

It’s an ambitious program and improvements show up regularly. Occasionally I’ve had a problem making my account work the way it should, but the help department has been able to solve it for me.

by Bordeaux Jim

Like many others, I took French courses at University many years ago. When I finally had the chance to visit Paris in 2016, I began learning again. I tried many on-line apps, along with Rosetta Stone. I memorized phrases by listening to CDs during my daily commute to and from work. Slowly, very slowly, my vocabulary improved but I still had problems with the grammar. I was tired of learning phrases that I would never use and reading about things that just weren’t interesting to me in English let alone French. Then I discovered this app and my French language skills exploded. I have improved more using this app for the last 120 days than all the previous years combined! I am si grateful to this app that now I can travel to France and have a discussion with my French friends. Merci beaucoup Steve and all who have made this possible at this app!

by Brianblades

I’m deeply impressed with LingQ . Hearing and reading has helped with my general language comprehension so much more than the other apps that encourage forced memorization through banal flash cards and short statements like “this is my mom” etc. instead LingQ focuses on the theories proposed by Stephen Krashen and the like to encourage learning through “comprehensible input”
this app slowly encourages new word comprehension through short, generally comprehensible narratives that keep you in the perfect balance of understanding and mystery, always pushing you to expand your vocabulary while not overwhelming you to the language as a whole. It also allows you to mark your unknown words for future flash card review. I haven’t used it yet, but you can also meet with other native speakers and trade language lesson(invaluable!). It really is a one stop shop for language learners!

by TheDapperDan - Anthony

As we’ve heard from Stephen Kaufman, Stephen Krashen and many others: “language learning is the constant pursuit of acquiring a large vocabulary, the best way to do that is by listening and reading a lot to content that is meaningful to us and used regularly”

this app most definitely serves this purpose above and beyond. I cannot say enough great things about LingQ/company. Thousands of different kinds of content to read and listen to, no matter who you are or what your interests are, you will be able to find content that is of interest to you. Even if you’re a flashcarder, you have a home here. this app makes it very convenient to review hundred of flashcards if wanted within seconds.

My experience? In three short weeks, my listening level went from only understanding simple concepts in conversation to being able to follow and fully understand in depth to an intermediate conversation that I found on this app. Consistently learning, at least, being exposed to 150 new words for every 3 hour learning session. I’m confident that word count can be a lot higher, but I took a little bit slower and listen a lot more.

All in all, link is the absolute next best thing when it comes to language learning and I guarantee it will not be rivaled.

Stop telling the native speaker you don’t understand and download this app today!

by PolishLanguageLearning

Forget about memorizing endless stacks of flash cards with vocabulary. I’m not saying it’s worthless to learn vocabulary, but it’s important to learn the new word IN CONTEXT. Just as in English, one word in a foreign language can have lots of different meanings and depending on the language’s grammar, may even change its spelling. The way to really advance to the next level is through reading and listening within context. I’ve personally seen advances in my language level when I read more, but looking up words in the dictionary becomes tiresome. this app has access to lots of different reading material that is read out loud for you (and you can upload your own), and once you highlight words it automatically gives you the definition(s). I’m personally learning Polish and as it’s not a popular language here in the Bay Area, it’s hard to find material unless I purchase it from Poland, so I’ve found this really helpful.

by Verxta

Okay by most I mean that there might be some that come off as better, but they might not be. this app stand at the top and it might not even be able to see its forerunners from that high! I’m 15 and I’ve been learning a multitude of languages from French to Spanish to English(at least to improve my vocabulary) to now Latin it’s by far the best. Even if you’re learning your native or mother tongue it will still help you learn faster. I don’t have much to any experience with the forums as I don’t usually use them but the few that I have have been tremendously helpful. The only complaint that I would really have particularly with Latin in this app is that you can’t use the auto-text to speech function whereas before you’d be able to use it with a similar language like Italian (as they sound similar and are relatives of each other) not I have to intuitively build a sense of how new and unfamiliar words look to me to be read as.

by Tomas030599

this app is by far the most useful language learning app for self-learners. Unlike most apps, its main focus is not a guided course that will teach you similarly to a classroom teacher. Rather, this app’s strongest features are for the personalization of the material you study, which is the best way to learn once you have the bare basics down. LingQ will help you study from any text you want by enabling you to import articles, books, videos, songs into its reader. There, it is a breeze to go through the material and study it to achieve comprehension. this app’s reader integrates a variety of online resources that anybody studying a text in a foreign language would use (translations from multiple websites, google images, native dictionaries, verb conjugation resources, etc). It might be a little bit of a steep learning curve at first, but it is definitely worth the investment. I recommend watching their getting started page on their website to understand their approach.

by Occlusal

If Apple were to take all of the language learning apps they’ve ever featured and roll them into one super app, they still wouldn’t be able to match the power of this app. LingQ is not only well designed, it may be the best language learning tool ever available in digital form.

Not only is there a curriculum that can be followed to great effect, there is also the freedom to explore your target language at your own pace, using your own interests even to the point of turning just about any media source the internet has to offer into a language learning opportunity.

You simply cannot learn a language meaningfully by building a flashcard vocabulary devoid of context the likes of which are put forth in apps like Duolingo, Drops or Rosetta Stone. They simply cannot help you maintain the level of enthusiasm and reward that is required for advancement in an educational method as gargantuan as language learning. This is not so with this app. Just when you think you’ve hit a wall, this app has a way of showing you a bright light at the end of the tunnel.

If you want to actually learn a language, LingQ fulfills the major tenants of that goal. You will not be disappointed in both your use of LingQ and the expenditure of the monthly fee for expanded app use. Happy learning!

by Japutie

First I used it for 30 minutes before it was spamming me with upgrade requests and blocking me adding more words to my list. 7 day trial should mean regular use for 7 days but instead it means we tricked you into downloading LingQ and give us money before you actually get to evaluate LingQ.

I ended up doing the actual trial which you only get if you sign up for a plan and was happy for about an hour adding words to study then it came time to actually study and the UI is such a jumbled mess that I spent 10 minutes looking for the flash card study until I had to google it and it was a tiny icon in the corner. Then the actual flash card UI is overly complicated and I was immediately turned off and canceled my subscription but I kept getting spam emails telling me to continue my streak. I went to the Website and opted out of all emails and today the emails are still coming.

Overall terrible app

by Didi28384dnrjfj

After looking at the great reviews and people saying LingQ is amazing, (this app even claims it is the best) I decided to try it.

I was most excited about being read to while I followed along. But then when I came to a word I didn’t know, I was supposed to be able to highlight it and go back to somewhere else to look at it for later. The definitions that were offered were helpful maybe 10% of the time. I just stopped using that feature as it didn’t seem helpful. Maybe the user interface is bad?

It seems like their main aim here is to deliver meaningful content to the user in the form of articles, to which the user has expressed interest in the subject matter. But, for some reason, none of them seemed interesting to me. I guess I felt a little overwhelmed at everything I was supposed to sort through on my little iPhone app. It seemed crazily organized. Usually when I get an app, I want to explore and see what everything is and how I can work my way around it. This one seemed too expansive? (Maybe) to be able to do that? Anyway, it was difficult to navigate and not quite what I was looking for.

But I am currently living in another country and trying to learn the language of the country. I only speak English fluently. And I’m a beginner in Italian.

by Clarehuzi

I’ve always been fast at language learning and prefer to learn by myself instead of being in lectures. LingQ totally fits in my learning process. My current goal is German and I’ve been seeking for context that are accessible for beginners. After watching the vlogs from Akiyama San on Bilibili I decided to give this app a try. Turns out LingQ has just what I need. It’s such a brilliant idea to catalog words in given context and rate one’s own familiarity and decide if they should be reviewed or learned in the future. This is what I’ve been doing for years in my head but it was less efficient. I’m so glad Mr. Kaufmann made this into an app. This is the ultimate learning flow for any languages.

by Aquaddict

I’ve tried duolingo. Fabulous app. And I finished the whole content on Italian and got my golden owl. I am an avid Italki user, taking 4 lessons a week. I bought many books on learning Italian ( those mostly unused). Of all methods I’ve tried and still trying, this app came as a surprise. It has already taken me far surpassed what I’ve done on my own. Learning Italian is no longer a chore. I wanted to learn, but learning seemed so stressful before this app came along. With all other methods, I got the illusion that I can speak Italian, but my comprehension was not quite there. I am confident that with this app, I can finally get somewhere that I will be happy about. Hopefully in six months.