# Michel Thomas Language Library — user reviews > 98 indexed App Store user reviews of Michel Thomas Language Library by Hachette UK (Holdings)Limited, rated 4.20/5 from 156 ratings. - Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/michel-thomas-language-library/id1429578528/reviews - App overview in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/michel-thomas-language-library/id1429578528.md - Rating breakdown: 5★ 107 · 4★ 15 · 3★ 8 · 2★ 6 · 1★ 20 ## What do users think of Michel Thomas Language Library? Overall sentiment: mixed **Pros** - 🧠 Excellent language learning methodology - 🎯 Effective speaking-focused approach - 📱 Convenient offline access to lessons - ⏱️ Flexible short lesson format - 🚗 Great for learning while driving - 💡 Intuitive natural language acquisition - 👥 Engaging student interaction in recordings - 📚 Comprehensive course content **Cons** - 🐛 Frequent app crashes and freezing - ⏸️ Play/pause button unreliable - 💰 High pricing compared to competitors - 🔐 Account access and login issues - 📉 Poor customer support responsiveness - 🔄 Purchased content disappears after updates - ⚠️ Incompatibility with iOS updates - 📍 Loss of progress tracking - 🎨 Poor user interface design - 📥 Extremely slow download speeds - 🔊 Inconsistent audio quality - 🔗 Confusing track numbering system - 📱 Lock screen pause functionality broken - 🎧 AirPods/headset controls unresponsive **Commonly reported bugs** - App crashes on login - App crashes when opening audio files - Pause/play button unresponsive when phone locked - Pause button skips back 30 seconds - Progress bar out of sync with audio - Audio tracks fail to play despite downloading - Auto-play between tracks not working - App minimizes unexpectedly - Incompatibility with iOS 13+ updates - Sign-up button non-functional on iPad - Downloaded content shows 'coming soon' indefinitely - Purchased courses inaccessible after app updates - Device limit restrictions blocking legitimate users - App blocks access after multiple reinstalls - Slow loading screens for simple operations - Inconsistent play/pause icon display **Most requested features** - Bookmark/progress saving functionality - Lesson completion tracking - Better pause/play button responsiveness - Improved UI design with larger control buttons - MP3 file access for external players - Subscription option for all courses - Spaced repetition reminders - Real-time speaking feedback - Consistent track numbering with PDF booklets - Better integration with lock screen controls - Dark mode option ## Newest reviews (17 of 98) ### 2/5 — Expensive now *2026-02-06* I have bought the entire Michel Thomas Spanish, German and Greek courses as apps in the past more than once, but after a couple of years they stop working. Now they no longer exist in the app shop and have to be bought from the website to add to the app. The Foundation courses are far more expensive than they used to be and there is no option of buying them lesson by lesson. I can’t afford to pay out £80 in one go for the Greek foundation course and it’s very annoying that ai should have to when I have bought the course at least twice before. **Developer response:** Please reach out to our friendly support team at support@michelthomas.com so we can assist you - if you have previously purchased courses on our legacy app you do not have to repurchase these courses. Our support team are looking forward to hearing from you so we can sort this out for you asap. ### 1/5 — Keeps crashing *2024-03-28, version 2.2* I love the Michel Thomas method and just purchased the first hour in French but the app keeps crashing. It’s unusable. Hoping to figure out how to get my money back and I’ll just use the web version. ### 2/5 — Great content, terrible app *2023-01-14* The app is terrible in every sense. It’s utterly unreliable. Pause-restart doesn’t work in background mode half the time. Sometimes it won’t go to next lesson after you finish one. The app crashes frequently. I used to listen to Michel Thomas MP3s back in the day and I miss the stability of that archaic experience. The app adds nothing other than making everything terribly difficult. The content is great. Which is a shame. **Developer response:** Thank you for saying that the content is great but we’re very sorry to hear of the difficulties you experienced; our app updates should have solved this for you but in case you are still experiencing difficulties please email our support team at support@michelthomas.com so we can get you back on track with your language learning on our app. ### 1/5 — Amazing course - buggy app *2022-12-20* The course is amazing, this review is for the app!!! The audio player in the app has several buggs that kill the purpose of using the app. The pause button is often unresponsive and the progress bar not in sync with the recording. While listening to the recording phone screen locks so it becomes impossible to pause unless using a headset. As reported other reviews the headset does not help much because of laggy/unresponsive pausing. The UI is poorly designed to say the least. The player buttons take maybe 10% of the screen space while useless image takes up 90%. It seems that very little consideration went into designing and developing the app. Experienced software develop could fix the mentioned issues in a day… Such a shame that the app does not do justice to the course. **Developer response:** Thank you for saying that the course is amazing, however we are very sorry to hear of the bugs you have reported and the inconvenience this has caused you. We update our app regularly so please ensure your automatic updates are toggled on so that you always get the latest version of the app with bug fixes. Don’t hesitate to contact us at support@michelthomas.com if you experience any bugs so we can make things right for you. We are also taking your design suggestions into account for our future development, and are committed to continuing to develop the app in a way which enables an optimal learning experience for our users. ### 2/5 — App player not great *2022-11-26* Not a review of the content of the language courses (which are great). The player in the app is just a bit bad….. I use an iPhone 11 and pause/playing from my airpod pros doesn’t always work with this player, which results in not being able to pause in time to do an exercise, then having to open the app, rewind etc. the only way to get the play/pause function to consistently work for me is to have the app open, which is a drain on battery and is a pain when walking around, for example. I’m not a developer but this seems like quite an easy thing to fix? Or just let us have the mp3s so that we can play on a better player? **Developer response:** Thank you for saying that our language courses are great, however it is disappointing that the bug you experienced with your Bluetooth headphones has detracted from your experience using our app. We're committed to updating our app regularly to remove bugs to ensure a smooth learning experience - please ensure your automatic updates are toggled on so that you are always accessing the latest version with fixes. If you experience any technical glitches in future please feel free to reach out directly to our technical team at support@michelthomas.com. ### 1/5 — App is too badly build it doesn’t work *2022-08-21, version 1.8* This could be good content but the app is so badly build that the lessons don’t load and keep on crashing. So far I have not been able to access more than 20% of the content. I tried to uninstall the app and install it again which unlocked 2 more lessons. But when I tried it a second time the App blocked me completely saying I cannot have the app on more than 5 devices. I only have it on the same one!!! I tried to contact customer support but the website crashes. I emailed them but no reaction. On top of wasting your money on an absolutely frustrating app you get to waste your time on non existing customer support too! Better try anything else from YouTube to Doulingo or Verbling. ### 2/5 — Poor app *2022-07-25, version 1.8* The lessons are good but the app is not well made, makes it a hassle to use. ### 1/5 — I loved this app, as in past tense! *2022-07-11* I loved this app and have recommended it to countless friends and colleagues many of whom have gone on to buy it as well. But now I feel terrible because they will be in the same boat I’m in. Upon upgrading my phone, this app won’t download like all the others. There are directions given on what to do if your purchase doesn’t download, which I’ve followed and emailed support with no resolution. So although I love the app and would like to continue my training, it’s too steep a price to have to repurchase every time upgrade my phone and iPad. It’s too bad. ### 1/5 — Good content - Disaster app *2022-06-28* I totally recommend Michel Thomas' audio lessons (his method works!) but this app is a disaster. The play/pause button works in the first few minutes then stops. It also never works on lock screen and the time monitor - which tells you where you are in the lesson - is always off. When you download a full language file, some tracks simply do not play, even though it appears that they have been downloaded. I tried to get around it by deleting and reinstalling the app, but the problem occurs again with different tracks. There is also no way to erase/re-download a track that does not play, so you simply lose so much content because of this faulty app. Not to mention, of course, that there is no way to bookmark where you've reached, mark lessons "done" or track progress in any way. It's such a shame to waste such a valuable learning method in a cheap and faulty app. Such wasted potential! I hope the company realizes this and invests in more competent developers who can at least develop a decent platform!! (Look at how the Pimsleur app works for example!!). ### 2/5 — Great Method App really needs work *2022-06-28* The method is very helpful. How ever the app itself really needs improvement! At the beginning he says how important it is for you to pause it but when the iPhone is locked or the app is not open, it does not pause correctly. It takes hitting the pause and play button twice (so 4 presses total) just to pause it when the phone is locked. By that time part of the answer has been given, I am distracted and frustrated. Also when the app is open it glitches up but not as badly. I would recommend putting the time runner (line with the track of the time of the audio) further away from the pause button. It is hard to press pause and not hit the line - and then messing up where I was in the podcast. I have to look at it and be very careful not to mess up the time- which is distracting from the material. Fix these pause/play issues and I would gladly purchase the whole set for the language. But until then it is much too frustrating and distracting. ### 1/5 — Ridiculously expensive *2022-05-31* Compared to Duolingo these language apps are way overpriced. I bought Greek, Arabic and Spanish at great expense a few years ago. Michel Thomas only did the Spanish one and there is no doubt he has a gift for teaching. The Greek course also has an excellent teacher but only covers the basics. Inexplicably the developers deleted the sound files and made the courses unavailable (despite having paid for them) I would be very wary of buying any as likely to be deleted again by the developers. The only advantage of the MT method is that you can listen to them while driving as there are no buttons to press and less interaction. That’s probably not a good thing anyway. **Developer response:** Thanks for your feedback, we are happy to hear you have enjoyed our Greek, Arabic and Spanish courses. We want our courses to be accessible to as many people as possible whilst maintaining the best quality. We work with highly skilled teachers to produce all of our courses; please be assured that all content produced since Michel’s passing strictly adhere to his method. Our course prices reflect the considerable work involved in producing them, many of which go from beginner all the way to advanced levels, and as such are a long-term investment in your learning. However, it sounds like you unfortunately experienced a temporary bug which meant you were unable to access your course audio for a time. Please accept our apologies for the inconvenience, and please don’t hesitate to reach out to support@michelthomas.com if you require any further assistance. ### 1/5 — You will lose your money spent on purchased courses!!! *2022-05-07, version 1.8* Here’s how they work… You spend lots of money on course lessons, they replace the app with a new one, then all your purchases no longer download. Money wasted. ### 1/5 — The lessons are fantastic, the app is awful! *2022-04-13, version 1.8* Lots of taps to get to the lesson. The audio does not keep the location. Some audio downloads but does not play. Slow on my pro max 13 iPhone. Very poor app. ### 1/5 — App is TERRIBLE! *2022-03-14* I love the content, but the app is REALLY letting the user down. Pausing fails most times, and you need to pause often in this app. And the downloading is excruciatingly slow, like dial up speed. I’m on a 300mb/s wifi and after an hour it’s still puttering along. Painful!!!! ### 2/5 — Good course, poor app *2022-03-07* I quite like the learning process but the app itself is very poor. The bulk of the screen is taken up with the logo leaving a very small space for the play / pause button making it difficult to hit - and you’ll want to hit that button a lot. Pausing also seems to sometimes rewind 30sec too. There also surely has to be a better way to link the text to the audio lesson too rather than hit the tiny chapter button and search through 69 pages of a pdf!! The whole app is pretty amateurish. ### 1/5 — Can’t get in! *2022-03-05* I downloaded the app and listened to the free first lesson. I didn’t set an account up and now it won’t let me register. All I have now is the login page which tells me none of my email addresses are valid so I can’t even try ‘Forgotten’ password. Tried deleting the app and downloading the app but no luck. Stuck at the login page forever! ### 3/5 — Useful but some UX issues *2022-02-19* While it’s very useful to have the audio available in an app, The app struggles with the very necessary requirement to play/pause Pros: - Really useful to have all of the audio in an app, audio can be downloaded offline so great if you’ve not always got access to data etc - Great to have the audio and resources available in the same place, resources can be accessed while the audio plays fairly easily. Improvements: - This may be a bug, play/pause doesn’t work as expected while the iPhone is locked. I’ve noticed when you pause from the Lock Screen, it actually skips back 30 seconds which can get confusing. While I can work around the issue by keeping the app open, it means I have to keep the app open at all times. - Sometimes while inside the app, the play/pause button shows the ‘play’ icon instead of the ‘pause’ icon and the audio bar is frozen in the wrong place. Pressing the play/pause icon still seems to act as it should but not clear where you are. - Once listening, going back to the list of audio isn’t very easy, the ‘chapters’ button is very low down on the bottom right corner making it really hard to press. - It would be useful to have some sort of placeholder to remind you where you’ve got up to if you have to come back. **Developer response:** Thanks for your feedback and suggestions to improve the app user experience – we greatly value your comments and are taking your ideas into account for our future development. We are also sorry to hear about the technical glitches you encountered. We update our app regularly to remove bugs, so please ensure your automatic updates are toggled on so that you are always accessing the latest version. Please do contact us at support@michelthomas.com if the issues persist so we can get them fixed. ## Most critical reviews (10 lowest-rated) ### 1/5 — Ridiculously expensive *2026-05-07, version 2.8* I could go to France and get a personal tutor for this amount of money. ### 1/5 — App doesn’t work *2025-12-30, version 2.5* App no longer opens… and id paid for a course. ### 1/5 — Keeps crashing *2025-12-22, version 2.5* I just installed the app but the moment I log in it crashes, and crashes instantly when I try to reopen it 🤷‍♀️ ### 1/5 — Fonctionne pas *2025-11-05, version 2.5* Demande de ce connecter ??impossible de créer un accompte ?? ### 1/5 — Paid for. *2025-10-11, version 2.4* I have bought this app a while back and with all the updates it removed my account. Now I can not get what I paid for. ### 1/5 — Buyer beware *2025-05-20, version 2.3* Purchased 2 languages, they changed formats and now have this app. My purchased content is gone and so are the apps. But hey can buy again for $100. Bad business model. ### 1/5 — App does no longer work *2025-04-14* This app no longer works. I reached out to the support team several times, but unfortunately there is no response. I purchased 10 hours of this very intuitive and quite brilliant programme, yet there is no tech support if there is a glitch. If it’s not usable, and if there is no support, you don’t have an app. **Developer response:** We’re very sorry to hear of the difficulties you’ve been experiencing; please email us at support@michelthomas.com so we can help make things right for you. We're committed to updating our app regularly to remove bugs to ensure a smooth learning experience and are grateful to you for bringing this glitch to our attention. We want to get you back up and running on the app and hope to hear from you soon. ### 1/5 — Scam *2024-09-03* I bought the lessons through the app and now I can’t access the lessons I paid for. Contacted customer support and haven’t heard anything back from them. Don’t waste your money people work too hard to have someone just take it from them like this. **Developer response:** We’re very sorry to hear you have been unable to access the courses you purchased via our website; please email us at support@michelthomas.com so we can investigate this for you and get you up and running with your language learning on our app. ### 1/5 — Test the free lesson before purchasing *2024-07-10, version 2.2* I heard some of the Portuguese lesson on YouTube and really enjoyed the style so was about to buy the full intermediate+advanced bundle, but tested out the free lesson first. The app is borderline unusable. It’s full of bugs and long loading screens for what should honestly be a very simple app. I might buy some CDs and load them on my device at some point if that’s an option, but I would not under any circumstances purchase these courses online with the intent of using them on your mobile device. ### 1/5 — No way to sign up for new users *2024-04-02, version 2.2* No way to sign up for new users ## Most praised reviews (10 highest-rated) ### 5/5 — Amazing *2026-05-29* I’ve been doing other apps for a while, but this is sensational. Great way to learn. **Developer response:** Thank you so much for your 5-star review! We're so thrilled to hear that you're enjoying learning with the Michel Thomas method! We greatly appreciate feedback from our valued customers; it motivates us to keep building and making the platform more enjoyable and useful for the users! Did you know that we have 19 languages to offer on our platform, with more to add in the future! We hope that you continue on this language journey with us and wish you all the very best! For any further queries or feedbacks, please don't hesitate to reach out to us at support@michelthomas.com. ### 5/5 — Best kept secret in language learning *2026-02-14* I don’t understand why this is not ranked higher or used by more people. It is hands down the only method that puts the language in your head and gets you learning through speaking. I can’t be bothered with games. I love love love listening to this and figuring out the language and hearing myself speak. **Developer response:** Thank you for your 5* review. It sounds like you've tried a few language learning methods - we are delighted to hear that you love the Michel Thomas Method the most. Leaving reviews helps others discover the Michel Thomas Method and learn languages effectively too; we are happy you're not keeping it a secret! Did you know we have 19 languages on offer so far, with plans to add new courses too - we wonder which language you will choose next. Wishing you all the best for your language learning :) ### 5/5 — french with Michel Thomas *2024-06-22* I have alwasy wanted to improve my school bopy French, but have never had an 'ear for languages'. I thought that at 50 I was too old to learn French. Michel showed me i was wrong. His method is just genius! It worlks so well around a busy life - its good for concentrated half hour sessions, but also for snatching five minutes here and there. I have found it especially good when driving. Merci beaucoup, mon Professor.! ### 5/5 — Best way to learn *2021-03-29, version 1.5* This is the best way to learn Italian that I have come across. Stay with it and focus and the language just soaks in. A real pleasure. Grazie! ### 5/5 — My Personnel Comments *2021-03-09* I have been trying to learn French for over 45 years. My wife comes from Mauritius and therefore I wanted to make her family understand me in their language. Over the many years I have managed to communicate with all her family with the very little French that I have learned doing reasonably well but I wanted to do much better and speak it fluently. My reading and writing French was far better than my spoken French. Since I have started this course my spoken French has improved substantially and I am now quite confident in communicating with my Wife. I have decided to continue with this method of teaching me French and have decided to advance to the next stage of learning. It has been a pleasure doing this course and will certainly recommend this to my family and friends. **Developer response:** Thank you for your praise for the Michel Thomas Method for learning French – we are absolutely delighted to hear that it has had such a positive impact on you and your family! It is also wonderful to hear that you are continuing to advance your French learning with our other French courses. Did you know that we have 5 French courses in total? After Foundation French, you can move onto to our intermediate and advanced courses, including our ‘Insider’s French’ course. Bon apprentissage ! ### 5/5 — Simple and Effective *2021-03-04* I started by upgrading my schoolboy French and Spanish and can now get by adequately in both. I am now in my sixties. A few years back I used Michel Thomas’ Mandarin to help me on a trip to China. Locals were amazed, as was I, at my ability to have minimal conversations. These courses, if taken as directed, in a relaxed state, really are miraculous. ### 5/5 — If nothing else works this will *2021-02-27* Recommended by someone else who also had trouble getting started in French I’ve tried Duolingo daily for nearly a year and this helped me so much more. If you’re worried or stressed you can’t learn French, just listen to these recordings and honestly he finds a low stress way to give you a foundation with words we already know. ### 5/5 — MichelThomas learn Portuguese *2021-02-19, version 1.5* Not cheap, but easily the best language course available. ### 5/5 — Arabic *2021-02-13* We love Jane Whightwick and Mahmoud Gaafal Jane is so encouraging and good fun , and Mahmoud has a gracious presence. The first male student is irritating because he often mispronounces Arabic so it is possible to misunderstand. Still the lessons are excellent thank you ### 5/5 — I started learning Spanish with MichelThomas now I teach Spanish! *2021-02-10* I could not believe how quickly I was able to learn a language. A half hour every day was enough to ensure that the whole course was completed in about 3 months. I found that going over each section 3 or 4 times enabled me to remember almost everything. I’ve just started Dutch and progress is just as quick. --- *Data collected daily from the US App Store and indexed by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/). User reviews are verbatim App Store reviews. Ratings, prices and chart positions refresh continuously; this snapshot is from 2026-09-09.*