Comparison

Babbel vs Learn

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Babbel

Master a new language with expert-designed, bite-sized lessons that fit your schedule. Build conversational confidence quickly through interactive practice and a smart review system. Learn Spanish, French, German, and more for travel, work, or fun.

Highlights
  • Bite-sized lessons
  • Expert-built courses
  • Interactive conversation practice
  • Smart review system
  • Grammar in context
  • Offline mode
  • Learn 14 languages
Features
Read full description

Speak a new language with real-life conversations. Babbel is the award-winning language learning app with courses tailored to your native language, built by 200+ language experts and trusted by millions worldwide. Because lessons are built for speakers of your language, an English speaker learning Spanish gets different lessons than a French speaker does. You learn to speak, listen, and understand grammar in context, then practice real conversations with Babbel Speak, an AI conversation partner that gives you personalized feedback. Learn a new language faster with bite-sized lessons designed to fit your everyday life. With Babbel’s proven method, you could start having real conversations in as little as 3 weeks. Your language learning adventure starts with a lesson. WHY BABBEL WORKS • Tailored to your native language: Courses are created by language experts and tailored to your native language, so you learn naturally and efficiently. • Real-life conversations: Learn the language people actually speak, for travel, work, and everyday life. • Speak with confidence: Practice out loud with speech recognition and Babbel Speak, an AI conversation partner to improve your pronunciation. • Research-proven results: Efficacy backed by researchers at Yale University: 100% improved their oral proficiency in 3 months.* TRUSTED BY MILLIONS • 25 million subscriptions sold • 1.5 million 5-star ratings (based on App store ratings) • After 10 hours with Babbel, 96% of learners saw better test scores on grammar and vocabulary** BUILT FOR REAL LIFE • Short, effective lessons: Learn in as little as 10 minutes a day • Lessons for every motivation: Learn for travel, work, or fun • Listen, speak, write: Options for every learning style • Stress-free conversation practice: Build confidence with Guided Conversations, then practice freely with Babbel Speak (Beta) • Smart review system: Boosts learning and retention • Grammar in context: Clear explanations exactly when you need them • Offline mode: Download lessons and learn anywhere, anytime • 5,000+ courses: Over 60,000 lessons across all languages LEARN 14 LANGUAGES Spanish (Latin American or Spain), French, Italian, German, Portuguese, English (American or British), Russian, Polish, Turkish, Norwegian, Danish, Swedish, Dutch, and Indonesian. TRY BABBEL TODAY Download Babbel now and take a free lesson. SUBSCRIPTION DETAILS A subscription is required to access full courses for one language. Subscriptions renew automatically unless canceled at least 24 hours before the end of the current period. Payment will be charged to your Apple account. Available plans: • 1 month • 3 months • 6 months • 12 months Privacy policy: https://about.babbel.com/en/privacy/ Terms of use: https://about.babbel.com/en/terms/ LEARN MORE Read Babbel Magazine for tips and insights: https://www.babbel.com/en/magazine Follow us: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/babbelusa Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Babbel.usa CONTACT US Questions or feedback? Email: support-mobile@babbel.com *Based on a study conducted with Babbel users learning Spanish. Available at http://bit.ly/BabbelYale. **Based on a study conducted with Babbel users learning Spanish. Available: http://bit.ly/BabbelMSU.

About

Learn

This app helps you learn languages by breaking down audio into sentences. It provides tools for listening, speaking practice, pronunciation feedback, and memorization. Track your progress and identify difficult sentences to improve your language skills.

Highlights
  • Sentence-by-sentence audio learning
  • Blind listening and imitation tool
  • Pronunciation and intonation feedback
  • Visible progress bar for learning
  • Recite mode for memorization
  • Error correction for text and phonetics
Features
Read full description

No matter what language you are learning, with just an audio file, we immediately let you listen, speak, learn, memorize and spell it sentence by sentence and finding out your listening, pronunciation and intonation problems immediately [Support learning 61 languages]. Outstanding Features: 1. Learning Sentence by Sentence ->​ Becomes so easy: Drag in or add in an audio file and you are good to go [see App Preview: V1]. 2. High-efficiency Blind Listening + Imitation Tool ->​ Each sentence starts with automatic continuous blind listening, and you can choose to imitate it directly and get individual letter-level hints when needed [V2]. 3. Cross Play:Makes Pronunciation, Intonation Problems not only can be Seen, but also can be Heard [V3]. 4. The innovative colorful and visible "Sentence Blocks Progress Bar" allows you to see Difficult Sentences, Learning Process and Results, etc. at a glance, and makes sentence by sentence learning super easy ->​ Every sentence you want to learn is so clear and visible that all you have to do is click on it. 5.Rich and Extensively sourced audio text books. Main Function: 1. Listen: Auto-play repeatedly according to your choice: 1.1. Single Sentence [Step mode: Default] / All Sentences [normal] / Sentences marked with "Difficult" [normal + difficulties] 1.2. Original Soundtrack only 1.3. Your voice only 1.4. Cross play [you said, then the original] 2. Speak, Check and Hint: 2.1. Immediately display each word and phonetic symbol you say. 2.2. Automatically check each sentence and show the correct part of what you said in the original area. 2.3 Letter-level hints. 3. Learning: 3.1 You can check the text, translation and phonetic symbols of each sentence at any time [P3, P4] 3.2 supports text right-click menus. So you can easily use third-party apps such as audio dictionaries, etc. [P7] 4. Recite and Bear in mind 4.1 In [Recite] mode: Choose a sentence that was correctly spoken before and see if you can still say it correctly in 7, 15, or 30 days only based on its translation? [P5] 5. Spelling/Back Translation 6. Browse, Copy, or Print Text, Phonetic Symbols and Translations. [P6] 7. Correct errors Errors in text and phonetic symbols due to recording quality or teacher's accent or current network status, etc., can be corrected by: 7.1. Tap the "Edit" button to modify its text, phonetic symbols and translation. 7.2. Try to merge 2 sentences. 7.3. Try to split the sentence. 7.4. If you said it out correctly, tap the [Bingo? ] Button 7.5. Import the sio file shared by others 8. More 8.1. Auto starts learning from the last sentence you quit. [entry -> book] 8.2. The number of sentences on "Sentence Blocks Progress Bar" can be adjusted according to the speed of specific audio file. 8.3. Background playback and headphone control* enable you to learn anywhere, anytime. .One click: play / pause .Double Click: Play the next sentence .Press 3 times: Play the previous sentence 8.4. Swipe Left / Right to choose Previous / Next sentence. 8.4 Multiple screen. 9. Settings & Select a Dictionary 9.1. To get the correct text: Please make sure that the language code is consistent with the recording language you are learning. 9.2. To get your native language translation: In the preferences, set your native language to the language of the translation you want to get. 9.3. Get phonetic symbols*: Install one of the following dictionaries. .New Oxford American Dictionary .Oxford Dictionary of English .Chinese, Traditional-English .Oxford-Hachette French Dictionary .Oxford German Dictionary .No installation required for learning Chinese *Currently only US, English, French, German and Chinese are supported. 10. Others 10.1. Requires iOS 14.0, MacOS 11.0 or above 10.2. Built in a Chinese and an American MP3, download to experience 10.3. 5 sentences free trial [any audio file], unlimited use on all Macs, iPads and iPhones for a total of only $2.99, support family sharing.

Screenshots

Babbel4 screens
Learn4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: Babbel at 44% against Learn's 0%. Babbel also leads on update cadence (every 5 days vs every 6 weeks) and chart position (#12 vs unranked). Learn's advantage is monetization model (free vs subscription) and ads (none vs shown). On price and in-app purchases 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Babbel sells 12 in-app purchases, starting at $17.99 per month and Learn sells 3 one-off in-app purchases. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Babbel ships an update every 5 days, Learn every 6 weeks. The most recent releases landed on September 28, 2026 and June 1, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard7 real differences · 4 level
Babbel versus Learn: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterBabbelLearn
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.7 (755K ratings) — better—
Positive reviews43.9% of reviews — better0.0% of reviews
Number of ratings755K — better—
Update frequencyEvery 5 days — betterEvery 6 weeks
AdsYesNo — better
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationSubscriptionFree — better
Best chart rank#12 — better—
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad, iPod, Mac — better
Requires iOS17.014.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size263 MB34 MB
Age rating12+4+
DeveloperBabbel GmbH秋生 廖

Customer experience

Babbel

All ratings754,664 ratings
Positive93.8%
Neutral3.8%
Negative2.5%
Written reviews2,668 reviews
Positive43.9%
Neutral13.9%
Negative42.2%

Learn

Written reviews1 reviews
Positive0.0%
Neutral100.0%
Negative0.0%

Bugs and requests

Babbel

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • Lessons sometimes freeze or crash the app
  • Subscription cancellation process is overly complicated
  • Inconsistent behavior when switching between languages
  • Keyboard issues and inability to use system keyboard

Requested features

5 requests
  • Add more language options, especially Asian languages like Japanese, Korean, and Chinese
  • Improve review and practice tools to better reinforce learned material
  • Provide more customization options for lesson pacing and content
  • Implement a more forgiving scoring system and allow users to revisit past lessons
  • Add a dark mode and optimize the app for better readability

Learn

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

12 purchases

Babbel

Subscriptions12
  • Mexican Spanish – 1-month plan$17.991 Month
  • Spanish 1 month$17.991 Month
  • French 1 month$17.991 Month
Show 9 more
  • Italian 1 month$17.991 Month
  • Mexican Spanish - 1-month plan$19.991 Month
  • Mexican Spanish – 3-month plan$45.993 Months
  • Learn French – 3-month plan$45.993 Months
  • Learn Spanish – 3-month plan$45.993 Months
  • All Languages – 3-month plan$53.993 Months
  • Mexican Spanish – 1-year plan$89.991 Year
  • All Languages – 12-month plan$107.991 Year
  • All Languages – 12-month plan7 Days trial$107.991 Year
3 purchases

Learn

One-time3
  • get 100 Checks$0.99
  • upgrade to unlimited$1.99
  • Unlimited voice checks.$2.99

Questions

Is Babbel free?
Babbel is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Learn free?
Learn is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Do Babbel or Learn have ads?
Babbel shows ads; Learn does not.
Which is updated more often, Babbel or Learn?
Babbel ships an update every 5 days, and Learn every 6 weeks. Most recently, Babbel was updated on September 28, 2026 and Learn on June 1, 2026.

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