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Duolingo app is bad

Duolingo app is pretty bad... it actually crashes. It pauses for prolonged periods after ads, and sometimes never recovers, requiring a shutdown and restart. The quality is embarrasing...

All crashes happen after ads, confirming my bias

Had they offered a free set of lessons and a clean way to purchase the product I would have paid by now. But kind of glad I didn't. For free, willing to tolerate the shitty app, for now.

Aside from crashing, I found problems with with the methodology.

New words are not introduced! You encounter them in questions and have to guess the meaning.
There is a 'new word' icon at the top, but very often it lights up for words that are not new at all.
Pacing is off. I am usually ok with taking it slow, but sometimes it is like watching paint dry, with the same 3 words over and over.
If you are using the free version, ads are completely distracting; you are penalized severely for errors (not a good idea in my experience).
There is a page for lesson notes, but it is completely inadequate. I need to see at least verb conjugations in one place, etc.

I will continue using it for now as I feel I'm still getting some value out of it, but the limitations are quickly mounting.

Posted in: s/Language_Acquisition

🚀 stack [mod]

Feb 19 · 6 months ago

3 Comments ↓

🚲 CitySlicker · 2024-02-19 at 19:30:

Perhaps this deserves its own thread, but what ways have you guys found work in language acquisition? I’ve tried duo lingo a few years back and found it to be pretty bad.

🚀 stack [OP/mod] · 2024-02-19 at 21:29:

@CitySlicker: duolingo is a lot better than it was a few years back, but I would not call it great. There are a lot of youtube segments, slow stories and even complete courses for the more popular languages (English, French, Spanish, etc). Some look pretty good...

👻 mediocregopher [...] · 2024-02-20 at 07:22:

We don't all have time for it, but taking a real class was what really helped me get somewhere. With Duolingo I made it through like two verb tenses within a year. Taking a class I did the other ten (?) in a few months. It was exhausting but it did really help. And it's nice to have teachers who will actually answer questions and have real conversations with you.