You're dead, Duolingo
Or how language learning apps make everything worse
Slowly, surely, and without fully realising it, I became the sort of person I didn’t want to be. This outcome may not be Duolingo’s fault, but, hey, you’ve got to blame someone, and Duolingo is as good a target as any.
Let me throw some glitter in the air to instigate a flashback. I moved to the Netherlands in the heady days of 2018. Because one of my deeply-entrenched beliefs is that if you live somewhere you should learn the language, long before I boarded that plane, I was using Duolingo to learn Dutch.
And did I? In this year of our lord 2025? Kan ik Nederlands spreken?
No. I can’t meaningfully speak Dutch — I became the sort of person I didn’t want to be. And that’s all down to Duolingo.
Well, okay, that’s not really or entirely true; it’s not Duolingo’s fault per se, but it does bleed into a wider story about the benefits (and downsides) of using apps to learn language.
It’s time to go Craig David and Artful Dodger, and rewind.
When I arrived in the Netherlands, I tried to pick up the language, I really tried. I took several Dutch courses, expanding my knowledge and helping me gather the basics. It was… fine.
The thing is, the Netherlands — and especially Amsterdam — is a pretty unique place when it comes to English. The country has one of the highest levels of proficiency in the language outside of non-native countries, with somewhere between 90% and 93% of the population speaking it.
This is intensified in Amsterdam, an international city with a global workforce. There’s almost nothing you can’t do here in English, from making friends and working in a bar, to sorting out your gas bill and getting a mortgage.
To put it bluntly: there’s little reason to learn Dutch. There’s not much incentive. It’s not like being in a country like France or Germany where swathes of people don’t speak English. Genuinely, I’ve lived in Amsterdam for seven years and haven’t met a single Nederlander who wasn’t what we’d call fluent in the UK.
What this means in a positive sense is that the main reason to learn a language, to connect with people, simply isn’t as pressing. I’ve made amazing Dutch friends and felt part of a local community through English.
Now I want to be clear: this isn’t an excuse. It’s merely a circumstance that helped my devolution into being the letdown I am.
At first, I put effort into Dutch, but with COVID and the lockdowns, language learning fell down my radar. And when all these restrictions lifted, there was so much to do, a world to explore.
In a blink, I’d been in the country for five years. In that time, I became the person I didn’t want to be: a foreign national living in a place where I couldn’t speak the language.
I decided to rectify it. I had to try. And, in this spirit, I returned to Duolingo’s feathery embrace.
If you don’t know it, Duolingo is the most popular language learning app in the world. It has over 130 million monthly active users, and sees more than 13 billion exercises completed per week. Effectively, it’s a big fucking deal — and is worth a lot of money.
While there are a gamut of reasons for its success, the key one is it turns learning into an addictive game. You complete little language puzzles and are encouraged to maintain a streak, drawing users back regularly.
This is all well and good, apart from the elephant owl in the room: Duolingo doesn’t actually work.
Definition is important here. By not working, I mean Duolingo simply isn’t going to give you the tools to have a conversation in a foreign language. Despite all the research it publishes “to prove” apps are a worthwhile way to gain a new tongue, they simply aren’t.
The wording is similar across most of these studies: Duolingo and other apps can improve your language skills.
This is technically correct, but it kinda misses the point.
If you spend a month doing Duolingo lessons, you’ll be better at the language compared with someone who’d done nothing. Thing is, apps won’t elevate you. Studies have shown they’re great for beginners and adding vocabulary, but you’re simply not going to become a natural speaker by only using apps.
Thankfully, I now know this.
When I first starting taking Dutch seriously again, I was fully onboard the Duolingo train. Because of these streaks and notifications and gamification, it felt like I was progressing. The reality, though, is I was simply adding words with no understanding of how the language fit together.
After feeling this, I did my favourite thing: research. And through that I discovered my fatal error of only using one source of learning. A silly app.
This is a pretty obvious thing for most people who have got fluent at a foreign language, but from someone who only learnt it at school, I never really dove into how to properly pick up a tongue.
And — although I’m far from fluent — these general principles make a huge difference as a monolinguist. Effectively, there’s no way to “hack” learning a language from scratch. It’s work, and requires time and persistence.
Shocking, I know.
The other key element is incorporating a variety of learning methods. For example, I use a flashcard app for vocabulary, listen to podcasts and watch YouTube to try and get the feel for the language, and have a weekly online lesson for grammar and speaking.
It’s a blend of learning methods alongside as much immersion as possible. Duolingo could never.
Yet despite shitting all over the app, I still use it every day. Not so much to learn, but almost as a timer, telling me each day that I need to practice, at least do something towards picking up Dutch.
Of course, you could ask a simple question here: how the hell would I know how to be fluent in a foreign language?
I guess, the honest answer is that I don’t, but I am trying and, in throughout this process, I’ve improved a lot. I’m probably about as good at Dutch as a seven year old in this country is at English. Not a particularly high bar, mind, but it is a bar.
So here’s the takeaway: if you want to learn a language, don’t rely on an app. Look at other methods. Expand your horizons.
The most important thing, though, is I’m on my way to being the person I want to be. Which, in reality, is less of a person I don’t want to be.
Yeah, right now ik ben niet goed in Nederlands, but, maybe one day, far off into the future, I might just get goed. And that’s worth working towards.