Ponkan vs Speaking
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side โ with what reviewers say about each.
Ponkan
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PRACTICE. MAKES. PERFECT. Practice speaking Mandarin Chinese with Ponkan! Ponkan converts your speech to Pinyin in real time so that you and correct your tones and pronunciation with immediate feedback. While this app might not a course on how to learn Mandarin, it is intended to be complement any course that you might be enrolled in.
Speaking
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Learn Spanish, French, German and other languages with "Speaking"! The fastest way to learn a new language is to practice speaking and listening. Speaking uses speech recognition to listen and transcribe your pronunciation. Then, Speaking gives you the opportunity to check your pronunciation for correctness. If you don't know the proper pronunciation, just type it into Speaking and Speaking will tell you the proper pronunciation. There are times when Speaking does not recognize your pronunciation well. But don't worry. This is your chance to improve your speaking skills, learn proper pronunciation from Speaking, and then try speaking again, paying attention to your accent. If the app can recognize your speech, your speech will work for people! Try using the app in conjunction with your regular vocabulary book or language book to practice your speaking. Your learning efficiency will be greatly improved! Speaking supports the learning of many languages. * โข English, Chinese, Spanish, French, German, Japanese, Korean, Arabic, Hindi, Portuguese, Russian, Vietnamese, Italian, Turkish, Polish, Ukrainian, Thai, Romanian, Indonesian, Malay, Dutch, Hungarian, Czech, Greek, Swedish, Croatian, Finnish, Danish, Hebrew, Catalan, Slovak, Norwegian *The above is just an example. Supported languages depend on the voice data installed on your device. You may be able to install more voice data from your device's settings app. Enjoy your speaking practice! The app uses the standard Apple Terms of Use (EULA). https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Ponkan at none against Speaking's 1. Ponkan also leads on ads (none vs shown). Speaking's advantage is update cadence (weekly vs every 5 weeks). On price, device support and iOS requirement there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price ยท Rating ยท Positive reviews ยท Number of ratings ยท Update frequency ยท Ads ยท In-app purchases ยท Monetization ยท Best chart rank ยท Devices ยท Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Speaking sells 1 in-app purchase, starting at $1.99 per month. Ponkan asks for nothing beyond the download.
Ponkan ships an update every 5 weeks, Speaking weekly. The most recent releases landed on October 2, 2026 and October 4, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Ponkan | Speaking |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Update frequency | Every 5 weeks | Weekly โ better |
| Ads | No โ better | Yes |
| In-app purchases | No โ better | Yes |
| Devices | iPhone, iPod | iPhone, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 15.0 | 15.0 |
| Further details โ not scored | ||
| Size | 0 MB | 19 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Bracket Ltd. | Ryo Aoyama |
In-app purchases
Ponkan
No in-app purchases
Speaking
- Remove ads$1.991 Month
Questions
Is Ponkan free?
Is Speaking free?
Do Ponkan or Speaking have ads?
Which is updated more often, Ponkan or Speaking?
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