Best free app for learning a language, honestly ranked
There is no single best free language app. Here is what Duolingo, Anki, Tandem, HelloTalk and live voice rooms each do well, and the mix I would use.
There is no single best free app for learning a language, because learning a language is at least three jobs: building vocabulary, understanding grammar, and speaking with real people. Free apps do the first job well, the second job so-so, and the third job only if you pick the right kind. My honest answer is a mix. Use a game-style app like Duolingo for the daily habit, Anki for words you keep forgetting, and a conversation app for the part that actually makes you fluent. I built Hashti, a free voice and chat app for adults, so I have a side in the third category. I will say where it helps and where it does not.
Start with what you are trying to do
Before you download anything, decide which problem you have.
If you know almost nothing, you need structure and a reason to come back every day. That is a habit problem.
If you know a lot of words but freeze when someone speaks to you, you need conversation. That is a speaking problem, and no flashcard will fix it.
If you understand people but make the same mistakes over and over, you need correction. That is a feedback problem.
Most free apps solve the first problem. Very few solve the other two without a human on the other end.
The game-style apps: Duolingo and its cousins
Duolingo is the obvious name, and it earns it. It is free to use with ads, it is built to be opened for five minutes a day, and it makes the first weeks painless. For a beginner, that matters more than any feature, because the learner who quits in week two learns nothing.
Where it is weak, in my opinion, is the jump from tapping answers to producing sentences on your own. You can finish a lot of lessons and still not be able to order a coffee out loud. That is not a defect so much as a limit of the format. Use it as a warm-up, not as the whole plan.
Other game-style apps work the same way, and the choice between them is mostly taste. Pick one, and stick with it for a month before judging it.
Flashcards: Anki, free and a little ugly
Anki is a spaced-repetition flashcard tool. It shows you a word right before you would forget it. It is not pretty and the first hour is confusing, but for vocabulary nothing free beats it, in my experience. Spaced repetition is well established as a way to remember things.
Make your own cards from words you actually met, in conversations or songs, rather than downloading someone else's thousand-word deck. Words you met in context stick. Words from a list rarely do.
One caution: the free availability of Anki differs by device, so check the store listing for your phone before you plan around it.
Language exchange apps: Tandem and HelloTalk
These apps pair you with a native speaker of the language you want, who in turn wants to learn yours. You trade messages, voice notes, and sometimes calls. They are the best free way I know to get corrections from a real person who is not charging by the hour.
The trade-off is that exchange partners are volunteers. Some are wonderful and some vanish after two messages. Some people are there for something other than language, which is a real problem on any app that lets strangers message each other freely. Keep your first chats on the app, be clear that you are there to practice, and use the block button without guilt.
Free AI tutors
An AI chatbot in voice mode is a patient, always-awake partner who never gets bored of your mistakes. It is very good for rehearsing a conversation before a real one, and for asking "why is it said this way?" at midnight.
What it cannot give you is the feeling of a person reacting to you: the pause, the laugh, the "sorry, say that again". That pressure is exactly what you need to train for. So use it as a rehearsal room, not as the stage.
Free content: YouTube, podcasts, music
Not an app in the usual sense, but arguably the best free resource of all. Native-speed content, with subtitles in the language you are learning, teaches your ear what textbooks cannot. Pick something you would watch anyway. Cooking, football, true crime, whatever. You will put in more hours if you like it.
Live voice rooms: the missing third job
This is where I come in, and I will be careful here, because I have an obvious interest.
Hashti is a free app for adults, 18+, out now on the App Store, with Android in a closed test. Its public rooms have names and topics, so you can walk into a room about, say, Persian music or Spanish practice and listen first. There are also private chats, calls and a walkie-talkie. You can browse the public rooms to see how it is laid out.
What I think it does well: it puts you in a room with several people at once, which is closer to real life than a one-on-one lesson. You can listen for a while, then speak when you are ready. And because identity is checked once against a government document, and unverified accounts cannot host rooms, speak in voice rooms or message strangers, the room is less likely to be full of throwaway accounts. If you want to know how the checks work, the safety page spells it out.
What it does not do, honestly: it is not a course. There are no lessons, no grammar explanations, no streaks. It is also newer and smaller than the big apps, so the number of rooms in a given language will vary, and a very niche language may have an empty room at your hour. The app's own interface is English today. A Farsi one is being built.
Live translation covers 29 languages and is part of Hashti Plus, at $4.99 a month or $39.99 a year. Everything else is free. Translation is a crutch worth using in the early weeks, when you cannot follow a fast speaker, and worth dropping as soon as you can. See how it works on the translation page.
The setup I would actually use
If I were starting a new language tomorrow, with no money to spend, this is what I would do.
Every day, ten minutes in a game-style app, only to keep the habit alive.
Every day, five minutes of Anki on words I met in real material.
Three times a week, a half-hour in a conversation setting: a language exchange chat, or a live room where I can listen and then speak.
Every day, some content I enjoy in the language, with subtitles, not as study but as company.
I speak English, Farsi and Armenian, and I learned each of them differently. What worked in every case was hearing real people use the language around something I cared about. The app is not the magic. The people are.
A quick way to choose
If you are a total beginner: start with a game-style app and add conversation after two or three weeks.
If you are stuck at intermediate: go straight to conversation, and use Anki to fix gaps.
If you are shy: rehearse with an AI tutor, then lurk in a voice room before you speak.
If you want correction: a language exchange partner, and ask them directly to fix your mistakes.
The honest bottom line
The best free app for learning a language is the one you open tomorrow and the day after. Beyond that, no single app does everything. Combine one habit app, one memory tool, and one place where you talk to humans, and you will beat anyone who spent a year hunting for the perfect app.
Hashti is free, and it is 18+. Hashti Plus — live translation, writing help and catch-ups — is $4.99 a month or $39.99 a year, and nothing else costs anything. How rooms work is on the rooms page, and how reports and the ID check work is on the safety page.