Language Lab vs Teach Yourself Library
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Language Lab
Enhance your language learning with interactive flashcards, quizzes, and audio exercises. Practice vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation with content from bestselling language programs. Study on-the-go and track your progress with this comprehensive tool.
- Flashcard sets with study and quiz modes
- Review quizzes for concept mastery
- Progress tracking and self-assessment
- Audio recordings of reading passages
- Pronunciation practice with native speaker comparison
- Text-to-speech pronunciation guidance
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This app helps you study vocabulary, grammar, verbs, and more from many of our bestselling language programs. Designed by our expert authors, these flashcards, quizzes, and audio recordings are perfect for study on-the-go! FEATURES: Depending on the program, this app supports McGraw-Hill books with: ● Flashcard sets, with study mode and quiz mode, for all vocabulary lists in the book. ● Review quizzes that provide additional practice and ensure mastery of key concepts. ● Progress checks that allow self-assessment of your understanding. ● Audio recordings of reading passages and exercise answers from the book. ● Record yourself function to compare your pronunciation with native speakers. ● Text-to-speech pronunciation guidance for most flashcards. LANGUAGES: English (ESL), French, German, Italian, and Spanish. Also, Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Korean. PROGRAMS: The content in this app is designed to support bestselling books from the Trade division of McGraw-Hill, including programs in our "Practice Makes Perfect", "Easy Step-by-Step", "Easy Reader", and "The Ultimate Review and Practice" series.
Teach Yourself Library
Access free audio and learning resources to supplement your studies. Download materials to your personal library for anytime, anywhere learning. Sync your content across devices for a seamless experience.
- Free audio resources
- Learning materials
- Offline access
- Cross-device syncing
- Downloadable content
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Discover a world of free audio and learning resources to accompany your Teach Yourself course. Teach Yourself has been trusted by learners for over 75 years to deliver expert learning materials across a wide range of topic areas – languages, business, careers, self-help, creative writing and hobbies. Now for the first time you can access any accompanying audio or learning resources in this free app. Download the resources to your Library and access anywhere anytime. You can even sign in from a different device and all your content will be queued for easy downloading. Teach Yourself: books that make life better.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Teach Yourself Library at 3.9 against Language Lab's 3.2. Language Lab's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 16) and iOS requirement (13.0 vs 15.6). On price, review sentiment, ratings volume and update cadence 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. Teach Yourself Library sells 16 one-off in-app purchases. Language Lab asks for nothing beyond the download.
Teach Yourself Library holds the better App Store score, 3.9 against 3.2. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 52 and 144 respectively. Written reviews point the same way: 24% of Language Lab's written reviews are positive against 31% of Teach Yourself Library's.
Both ship on a similar rhythm, roughly every 4 months. The most recent releases landed on September 21, 2026 and September 18, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Language Lab | Teach Yourself Library |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 3.2 (52 ratings) | 3.9 (144 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 24.1% of reviews | 30.5% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 52 | 144 — better |
| Update frequency | Every 4 months | Every 4 months |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Free — better | Free with in-app purchases |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 13.0 — better | 15.6 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 79 MB | 96 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | McGraw-Hill | Hachette UK (Holdings)Limited |
Customer experience
Language Lab
Teach Yourself Library
User reviews
Language Lab
From 52 App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 👍 Good companion to books
- 🚀 Helpful for practicing vocabulary and grammar
- 💡 Useful for hearing pronunciation
Room to improve
- 🐛 Audio issues (no sound, too fast playback)
- 🐛 Buggy and crashes frequently
- 🐛 Incorrect answers and mistakes in content
- 🐛 Missing features from certain books
- 👎 Unintuitive and poor user experience
Teach Yourself Library
From 144 App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 👍 Good content of books
- 👍 Helpful for language learning
- 👍 Clear audio pronunciation
- 👍 Easy to navigate interface
- 👍 Free titles available
Room to improve
- 🐛 Frequent crashes and bugs
- 🐛 App doesn't open or crashes on launch
- 🐛 Audio playback issues
- 🐛 Downloads fail
- 🐛 Poor user experience
Bugs and requests
Language Lab
Reported bugs
4 issues- Audio not working
- App crashing when trying to record
- Incorrect answers in quizzes and flashcards
- Missing content for certain books
Requested features
5 requests- Add audio playback speed controls
- Improve stability and reduce crashes
- Proofread content and fix errors
- Ensure all books are supported
- Enhance user interface and navigation
Teach Yourself Library
Reported bugs
89 issues- App doesn't open
- Crashes on launch
- Downloads not working
- App keeps logging off
- App not opening on iPhone
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- App closing spontaneously
- Requires internet connection when available
- Crashes when features are selected
- Arrow keys don't turn pages on Mac
- UI is confusing
- Clicking on buttons navigates pages
- No way to pop from book to collection
- Visual affordances lacking
- Clicking page makes text appear/disappear
- Book content broken across pages
- Default font tiny, font settings don't work
- App is unstable, crashes frequently
- Doesn't save progress
- Cannot play some downloaded audios
- No way to re-download audios
- App won't sign in
- Buttons too small to click
- Audio doesn't play
- Yellow text on yellow background
- No proper categories for genres
- Little accessibility options
- Menu is terrible, no easy way to select chapters
- App port of a browser page
- App says user has to pay for purchased content
- Audio player doesn't stay on Lock Screen
- Makes everything zoomed in and keyboard larger
- Audio dialogues don't work well
- App is rubbish
- Forced to use phone, not laptop
- Audio doesn't display track numbers
- Video in ebook says highlighting words, but can't
- Dictionary takes to external sites
- App not updated for larger screens
- Basic features like translation lookup missing
- No support received
- App says 'Coming Soon' for books
- Unable to access purchased books or sign in
- App quits or says 'coming soon' for audio
- App closes automatically when reproducing a book
- App closes automatically
- App crashes when opening files
- App crashes and won't open
- Audio doesn't work with iOS 13
- App keeps closed
- App crashes when playing a chapter
- Not compatible with iOS 13
- App crashes constantly when tapping on a book
- Audio app not working
- App doesn't open and listenings can't be heard
- Crashes on iOS 13
- Not working since iOS 13 update
- App crashes
- App automatically shuts down when clicking a clip
- Layout not compatible with iPads
- Cannot play audio content
- App closes when opening audio for Norwegian
- Upgrade stopped French from working
- Program keeps closing when trying to listen to lessons
- Can't open ANYTHING
- App crashing when choosing chapters/audio recordings
- Audio no longer works
- App crashes and shuts down when opening a new language
- App isn't working, program closes when playing French
- Not all languages available in audio library
- Missing language audio (Serbian, Latvian)
- App doesn't work from the beginning on iPhone X
- Terrible to sign into
- Doesn't allow profile creation or sign in via social media
- Error message and sent back to first page when skipping sign in
- No sound in ebook, icon present but no mention of audio
- App crashes after each track play when switching pages
- Downloading audio takes multiple retries
- Confusing app, hard to find/access audio
- No way to buy audiobooks or audio/book
- Audio download is good, but better chapter labeling needed
- App keeps closing even after uninstall/reinstall
- App closes when clicking on a clip to play
- Poor app design
- Cannot download audio to iTunes or media player
- Listening and re-listening is not intuitive
- App is a mess
- No control over content paid for
- No clear pictures, up-to-date phrases, or easy audio access
- Worst educational tool encountered
Requested features
15 requests- Track repeat functionality
- More exercises, words, and grammar
- Chapters listed as default
- Shorter jump forward/back options
- Audio player on lock screen
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- Longer pause between tracks
- Better chapter labeling for audio
- Make all complete language audio available
- Highlighting words in ebooks
- Proper in-app dictionary
- Update for larger screens
- Allow use of other e-reader software
- Download audio files to iTunes/media player
- More pause time for practice
- Add missing units
In-app purchases
Language Lab
No in-app purchases
Teach Yourself Library
- Pack of 2 Tokens$1.99
- Pack of 3 Tokens$2.99
- Pack of 10 Tokens$9.99
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- Pack of 11 Tokens$10.99
- Pack of 13 Tokens$12.99
- Pack of 15 Tokens$14.99
- Pack of 17 Tokens$16.99
- Pack of 18 Tokens$17.99
- Pack of 20 Tokens$19.99
- Pack of 25 Tokens$24.99
- Pack of 26 Tokens$25.99
- Pack of 27 Tokens$26.99
- Pack of 30 Tokens$29.99
- Pack of 35 Tokens$34.99
- Pack of 50 Credits$49.99
- Pack of 51 Credits$50.99
Questions
Is Language Lab free?
Is Teach Yourself Library free?
Which has better reviews, Language Lab or Teach Yourself Library?
Do Language Lab or Teach Yourself Library have ads?
Which is updated more often, Language Lab or Teach Yourself Library?
Other comparisons
