Whenever I get into a new game I love to look up a tier list of the different classes, characters, weapons, etc. so I don’t waste my time figuring out which weapons are crap and which are overpowered. Today I decided to make a similar kind of tier list with as many general (non-language-specific) language apps and websites I could think of.
I’ll start by showing you the whole tier list and then I’ll expand on my favorites + an honorable mention that I’ve recently become addicted to…
The Tier List
Overpowered: Anki, Netflix, iTalki
Excellent: Busuu, +Babbel, Glossika, Lingodeer, Forvo
Good: Quizlet, Memrise, Mango Languages
Meh: LingQ, Pod101, Drops
Shit: Duolingo, Hellotalk
(Why is Hellotalk so low? Fantastic idea, bad execution–ask any woman who has been on the platform and you’ll understand why…)
Top Picks
Anki: the must-have in any language-learner’s toolkit
Completely free-to-use (really)
Advanced scientifically-backed algorithm (especially if you use the new FSRS algorithm which is more fine-tuned)
Customizable with CSS/HTML & downloadable add-ons
Netflix
Dubbing and subtitles available in dozens of different languages so you can watch your favorite shows in your target language
If you use a VPN you can access the Netflix libraries of any country in the world
Fun and educational, best paired with Anki for new words you encounter
iTalki: 1-on-1 conversation or structured lessons
This is the ultimate language learning hack; any serious language learner will tell you how important this platform is in their language learning routine
Even a weekly lesson of 30 minutes will be enough to boost your progress and keep you motivated
Honorable Mention: Glossika
Glossika uses a spaced-repetition technique (like in Anki) but with whole sentences. Their method is based on the idea that you should be able to naturally pick up the vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, and linguistic structure by exposure.
I was skeptical of the listen-and-repeat method at first, but I eventually fell in love with the platform because of how natural the sentences were. Each sentence (all ~7000 of them) is recorded by a native speaker, which is quite hard to come by. Duolingo for example uses A.I. for their audio recordings so many times the pronunciations can be unnatural or outright wrong.
The sentences themselves are all things you would definitely hear day-to-day, e.g. “The train seems to be running late” or “Why isn’t she coming to the party?” as opposed to Duolingo’s “This is an apple.” Why is this important? If you don’t want to invest most of your time into the app, simply learning the sentences as they come (without Glossika’s intense repetition strategy) would already help you with conversational fluency.
The only thing stopping this from being overpowered is the lack of real structure (+ the CEFR levels don’t even actually align with the difficulty of the sentences) and grammar/nuance explanations.
But just because it isn’t completely overpowered doesn’t make it an excellent language learning tool, ESPECIALLY for those ‘unpopular’ languages that don’t get enough love resource-wise.
I hope you enjoyed the little tier list and If you made it this far I’d love to know what you think!
wishing you a resource match made in heaven,
langstudies
Do you have language questions you’d like answered on Hyperglot? Send them to @langstudies on Instagram or Substack!
I love seeing everyone's take on this. I definitely need to make my own version now!
I'd like to know how best to use italki so that I can see the improvements. I've been having 30 minute weekly lessons for the past couple months but I still feel I like the confidence and ability to speak.