For Japanese specifically, I’m using Renshuu (free) and Wanikani for kanji ($9/mo) and loving both of them.

Small promotion for [email protected], still a bit small but growing!

https://blog.thelinguist.com/comprehensible-input/

No such thing as a fish promotes Babbel, they have a code thingee too to get some percent off the first year.

I got a lifetime purchase of Lingodeer a while back, for super cheap during a back to school type sale I want to say in the $70 range. I’m trying to learn German but it has a good number of available languages. I’m not sure how it compares to other apps but I find it works well enough for me

I just started with wlingua. Seems decent enough.

I like Language Transfer. It’s free and you can download the episodes for offline listening.

Your answer is probably going to depend on the language and your learning style and preferences.

Personally I’ve found Duolingo to work pretty well as an English speaker learning esperanto, I can also recommend Lernu if you happen to be interested in esperanto. I’ve personally never had much luck learning other languages no matter how I try so I can’t really offer any recommendations for other languages, but it’s probably worth to keep in mind that what does or doesn’t work for others may be different for you, so don’t be afraid to try out some different programs to see what works best for you

Which language are you trying to learn? There are different answers depending on that.

As someone learning Hindi, I’ve found that Duolingo is wholly insufficient in grammar and vocabulary (the entire course is far too short) and did not concentrate on listening comprehension. I’ve started using a combination of the following:

• Clozemaster for vocabulary in context of (sometimes pretty wild) sentences. (I’ve got a lifetime subscription to Clozemaster, it goes on sale during holidays.) Clozemaster has grouped “common words” and a combination of reading/listening skill and multiple choice / vocab word transcription / entire sentence transcription. It feels very overwhelming at first as you’re just thrown in but keep at it - start with reading and multiple choice and once you know the words and sentences in your grouped section start typing them out via listening.
• A combination of textbooks and websites to explain certain grammatical concepts.
• A listening-based podcast, example Innovative Language, for listening comprehension. (This also goes on sale regularly.)

Anki is a lot more robust than just about anything else out there. Particularly as a supplement to other learning. I’ve been through a lot of different language learning systems and my anki decks have been a constant throughout.

I’ve enjoyed using Mango. It’s always been free but there’s a paid version now too. It dives right into useful conversation, but gives cultural context before, like formal/informal or when certain phrases are used. It has flash cards built between lessons to help with memorization and you can even record your pronunciation and hear/see the audio clip and how it compares to how you are saying it. It also has the ability to download lessons for offline use. I first used it because it was one of the only apps/websites that specifically taught the Levantine dialect of Arabic not found on other apps.

If you use it for sçhool, or a private course I can recomend QUIZLET. You can connect units from other users, or create your own. It’s a bit like a free Version of PHASE 6 (I only know the free Version of QUIZLET…)

But it’s totaly not like DUOLINGO.

• DUOLINGO is stand alone.
• QUIZLET is a helping tool for an existing course.

Check with your local public library. A lot of libraries offer online language learning programs.

I quite like busuu for Spanish so far. It is a lot better than Duolingo trash as it actually explains things rather than just throwing stuff at you that is often incorrect anyway.

The most important factor in language learning is consistency. So try to find something that is fun and engaging for you. Anki for vocab + textbooks or youtube lectures for grammar is one of the cheapest options.