Alternatives
Alternative to Duolingo: Wekos
Duolingo runs on hearts and streaks. Wekos runs on sentence drilling with no cap on how much you can practice, free.
Duolingo is the app most people try first, and its free version is genuinely playable for as long as you want. The thing that sends people looking for an alternative usually isn't price. It's hitting a wall of hearts, ads, or exercises that stay simple long after the course should have moved on.
The short version
What Duolingo does well
Duolingo's exercise variety and streak system are good at getting people to open the app every day, which is most of the battle for a habit that has failed before. The course library is enormous, and the free tier plays indefinitely rather than expiring.
If you like having a streak to keep, Wekos has one too, so you don't need to choose between a habit mechanic and an actual course. The difference below is what happens once you open the app.
Where Duolingo's free version stops
- Hearts: a run of mistakes stops the lesson until you wait, practice to earn more, or the day resets.
- Ads: short video ads appear between lessons on the free tier.
- Depth: exercises stay at matching and translation rather than building toward full sentence recall.
- No conversation partner: there's nowhere in the free app to actually hold a conversation.
What Wekos does instead
Wekos is sixteen sequenced units per language, each built around a grammar step, drilling real sentences with native audio in a male and a female voice. Every sentence breaks into its words, then its chunks, then five variations that change one piece at a time so the pattern is what stays constant.
Speaking cards listen while you talk and score whether you were understood, on your own device, with nothing sent anywhere. Eight conversation scenarios run entirely offline against a partner who stays in character and gives you feedback afterward, something the Duolingo free tier doesn't offer at all.
Streaks and skill scores are tracked too, so the habit-forming part isn't missing. What's different is that none of it is capped: no heart system, no ads, and no paid tier to run into later, because Wekos removed its paid tier and kept every feature that had been behind it.
Also included, free:
- Three playback modes (auto, semi-manual, manual), with repetitions adjustable from 2 to 15.
- A story every unit, read aloud in character, with comprehension questions and a translation a tap away.
- A twelve-question quiz at the end of every unit, mixing in questions from earlier units.
- Resume exactly where you left off, and save any unit for offline use.
- A self-issued CEFR badge at A1, A2 and B1.
| Duolingo (free) | Wekos | |
|---|---|---|
| Course structure | Skill tree, short exercises | 16 sequenced units per language |
| Sentence drilling | Translation/matching only | Word → chunk → sentence → 5 variations |
| Native audio | Single synthesized-leaning voice | Recorded male and female, adjustable speed |
| Speaking practice | Basic repeat-after-me | Scored on being understood, on-device |
| Conversation partner | None on free tier | 8 scenarios, runs offline |
| Streaks | Yes | Yes |
| Daily limit | Hearts | None |
| Ads | Yes, between lessons | None |
| Price to remove limits | ~$7–13/mo (Super) | No paid tier exists |
How to switch, or add Wekos alongside it
- Pick a language: Spanish, French, Portuguese, German, Italian, Mandarin, Cantonese or Japanese.
- Sign up with an email address. No card, because there's nothing to charge.
- Take the short placement test if you already know some of it, or start at unit one.
See the full best free language learning apps roundup for how Wekos compares to everything else, not just Duolingo.
Try Wekos free
The whole course, all 8 languages, unlimited practice, no credit card and no paid tier to hit later.