Duolingo vs Maiya Words &Language Notes
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Duolingo
Learn languages, math, music, and chess through fun, bite-sized lessons. Build vocabulary, grammar, and real-world skills with a science-based methodology. Track progress and stay motivated with a global community.
- Bite-sized language lessons
- Speaking, reading, listening, writing practice
- Math skills development
- Music reading and playing
- Chess strategy and gameplay
- Progress tracking and rewards
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Learn a new language, chess & more with the world's most downloaded education app! Duolingo is the fun, free app for learning 40+ languages through quick, bite-sized lessons. Practice speaking, reading, listening & writing to build your vocabulary & grammar skills. Designed by learning experts & loved by hundreds of millions worldwide, our lessons make learning effective & fun and help you prepare for real conversations in Spanish, French, Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Italian, German, English and more. And now, you can learn CHESS on Duolingo! Whether you're a total beginner or looking to level up your game, you'll love learning chess the Duolingo way. Play matches and fun chess lessons for all levels, no matter the language - chess, ajedrez, xadrez, schach, Шахматы, الشطرنج. • Chess: Learn the moves, level up your game & play matches in our Chess course. Learn the basics, solve fun chess puzzles & improve your strategy with guided lessons. Whether you're new to chess or already play, our course is designed to help you have fun and build real skills. Checkmate! • Math: Forget lectures and math worksheets! Built by learning experts, our Math course makes math feel like a game. Boost learning and fight the summer slide with standards-aligned math lessons for elementary school, middle school, and high school students. • Music: Learn how to read music & play songs in our Music course, no instrument needed! Using an on-screen keyboard, you'll learn bit-by-bit. Whether you're learning a language for travel, school, career or your brain health, you'll love learning with Duolingo. Why Duolingo? • Duolingo is fun & effective. Game-like language lessons & fun characters help you build speaking, reading, listening, & writing skills, plus enjoy fun chess & competitive online chess in one app. • Duolingo works. Designed by learning experts, Duolingo has a science-based teaching methodology proven to foster long-term knowledge retention across language lessons & chess lessons alike. • Track your progress. Work toward your learning goals with playful rewards & achievements when you make practicing language lessons or chess online part of your daily habit. • Join millions of learners. Stay motivated with competitive Leaderboards as you learn languages & play chess online alongside our global community. • Every course is free. Learn Spanish, French, German, Italian, Russian, Portuguese, Turkish, Dutch, Irish, Danish, Swedish, Ukrainian, Esperanto, Polish, Greek, Hungarian, Norwegian, Hebrew, Welsh, Arabic, Latin, Hawaiian, Scottish Gaelic, Vietnamese, Korean, Japanese, English, & even High Valyrian! And now, learn Math, Music & improve your Chess skills with fun, bite-sized lessons. What the world is saying about Duolingo: "Far & away the best language-learning app." - The Wall Street Journal "This free app & website is among the most effective language-learning methods I've tried… lessons come in the form of brief challenges, speaking, translating, answering multiple-choice questions, that keep me coming back for more." - The New York Times "Duolingo may hold the secret to the future of education." - TIME Magazine "Duolingo is cheerful, lighthearted & fun." - Forbes "I Can't Stop Playing Duolingo Chess." - Wired If you like Duolingo, try Super Duolingo for 14 days free! Learn a language fast with no ads & get fun perks like Unlimited Energy & Monthly Streak Repair. If you choose to purchase Super Duolingo, payment will be charged to your Apple account, and your account will be charged for renewal within 24-hours prior to the end of the current period. Auto-renewal may be turned off at any time by going to your settings in the App Store after purchase. Any unused portion of a free trial period, if offered, will be forfeited when the user purchases a subscription to that publication, where applicable. Privacy Policy: https://www.duolingo.com/privacy Terms of Service: https://www.duolingo.com/terms
Maiya Words &Language Notes
This app helps you learn new words and review them efficiently using spaced repetition. It also allows you to analyze and annotate essays, supporting multiple languages and rich text editing for a comprehensive language learning experience.
- Spaced repetition for word review
- Real-time word scanning and recognition
- Import and edit essays with rich text
- Multi-language support (Chinese, English, Russian, German)
- Customizable pronunciation and spelling recall
- Automatic daily word import
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A: Words 1. The first thing you see when you open the app is the words you should review according to the law of brain forgetting, simple and fast! 2. Considerate shortcut buttons, there are "notes", "dictionary" and so on on the word square of the word list page, which can directly display the corresponding page, and there is a red progress bar at the bottom of the word square to display the current memory progress of the word. 3. For quick query of related words, click the word in the upper left corner of each word box or click the word in the upper left corner of the word full screen page to enter the related word search mode. 4. Real-time scan to recognise words, click the scan button in the upper left corner of the home page, you can turn on the camera to recognise words, and you can adjust the width of the recognition area to adapt to words of different lengths. 5. Rich word books and dictionaries. 6. The function of automatically importing new words, the App will automatically import new words from the classification every day according to the order of word classification, and you can adjust the learning order by dragging the classification box. 7. You can set the pronunciation of different regions, play automatic spelling on the home page, recall the memory of words according to the pronunciation, or open the simple interpretation mode to recall target words according to the paraphrase. 8. If you find a new meaning of a word that you have never seen before, you can mark the new meaning in the "hint" column of the word and reset the memory cycle. 9, Chinese, English, Russian, German four learning languages to choose from B: Essays 1. You can paste the text and definition into the App, and the App will automatically identify the learning language and interpretation notes 2. When reviewing, you can quickly control the display switching of learning language and note interpretation 3. Support rich text editing, including masking pen, font colour, bold, link, underline, and you can also edit the text in other rich text editors and paste it into the App. 4. Click on the source language text to pop up the explanation of the word and the translation of this sentence. 5. For essays that no longer need to be added with review reminders, the study can also be terminated. In short, everything is for more convenience, faster and more efficient! Maiya Word App-Premium Member Subscription Service Description 1. Service Name: Maiya Word App-Premium Member 2. Subscription price: $6.49 3. Subscription period: 1 year 4. Benefits you can get after subscribing to the service: unlock all advanced functions, unlock all advanced functions of the app in the future 5. After purchasing the automatic renewal service, 24 hours before the expiration of each billing period, the iTunes account will be automatically deducted and the membership validity period corresponding to the billing period will be extended 6. If you need to cancel the automatic renewal function, please manually open the Apple phone "Settings" --> Enter "iTunes Store and App Store" --> Click "Apple ID", select "View Apple ID", and enter the "Account Settings" page , Click "Subscribe", and select Dedicated Sign Member to cancel the subscription. If the automatic renewal function is not cancelled at least 24 hours before the billing period expires, the subscription will be automatically renewed and deducted 7. If you have any questions about this subscription service, please contact us at: maiyalanguage@163.com Terms of Use: https://maiyalanguage.fun/#/terms Privacy Policy: https://maiyalanguage.fun/#/privacy
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Duolingo at 4.7 against Maiya Words &Language Notes's 3.0. Duolingo also leads on ratings volume (5.5M vs 4) and review sentiment (65% vs 43%). Maiya Words &Language Notes's advantage is ads (none vs shown) and update cadence (every 3 days vs weekly). On price, in-app purchases and monetization model there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Duolingo sells 16 in-app purchases, starting at $9.99 per month and Maiya Words &Language Notes sells 3 in-app purchases, starting at $3.99 per year. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
Duolingo holds the better App Store score, 4.7 against 3.0. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Duolingo has 5.5M ratings behind it against 4, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 65% of Duolingo's written reviews are positive against 43% of Maiya Words &Language Notes's.
Duolingo ships an update weekly, Maiya Words &Language Notes every 3 days. The most recent releases landed on September 24, 2026 and September 8, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Duolingo | Maiya Words &Language Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.7 (5.5M ratings) — better | 3.0 (4 ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 64.6% of reviews — better | 42.9% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 5.5M — better | 4 |
| Update frequency | Weekly | Every 3 days — better |
| Ads | Yes | No — better |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Freemium |
| Best chart rank | #1 — better | — |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad, iPod, Mac — better |
| Requires iOS | 17.0 | 15.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 489 MB | 94 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Duolingo | 春鹏 崔 |
Customer experience
Duolingo
Maiya Words &Language Notes
Bugs and requests
Duolingo
Reported bugs
3 issues- Freezing or crashing during lessons
- Incorrect translations or answers marked wrong
- Inconsistent behavior of certain features like leagues
Requested features
5 requests- Add more languages, especially less common ones
- Improve grammar lessons and explanations
- Allow more flexibility in navigating the course content
- Provide better feedback and corrections for mistakes
- Sync progress and features consistently across app and web
Maiya Words &Language Notes
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
Duolingo
- Super Duolingo7 Days trial$9.991 Month
- Super Duolingo7 Days trial$12.991 Month
- Super Duolingo14 Days trial$12.991 Month
Show 7 moreShow fewer
- Super Duolingo2 variants$59.991 Year
- Super Duolingo14 Days trial2 variants$79.991 Year
- Super Duolingo14 Days trial4 variants$83.991 Year
- Super Duolingo7 Days trial$83.991 Year
- Super Duolingo7 Days trial4 variants$95.991 Year
- Super Duolingo1 Month trial$119.991 Year
- Super Duolingo7 Days trial$119.991 Year
- Chest of Gems$0.99
- Barrel of Gems (1200)$4.99
- Chest of Gems (1200)$4.99
Show 3 moreShow fewer
- Cart of Gems (3000)$9.99
- Barrel of Gems (3000)$9.99
- Cart of Gems (6500)$19.99
Maiya Words &Language Notes
- Maiya Pro - Yearly Renew$3.991 Year
- Maiya Pro - Yearly Renew$7.991 Year
- Maiya Pro$39.99
Questions
Is Duolingo free?
Is Maiya Words &Language Notes free?
Which has better reviews, Duolingo or Maiya Words &Language Notes?
Do Duolingo or Maiya Words &Language Notes have ads?
Which is updated more often, Duolingo or Maiya Words &Language Notes?
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