Drops vs Earworms
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Drops
Learn new languages through engaging games and visual aids. Practice vocabulary and common phrases in over 55 languages, from beginner to expert levels. Track progress, unlock achievements, and enjoy professionally curated lessons with native speaker pronunciations.
- Gamified vocabulary learning
- Visual learning aids
- 55+ language options
- Progress tracking and rewards
- Native speaker pronunciations
- Customizable learning goals
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Join over 50 million people who use Drops for free language lessons. It’s fast, fun, and easy! Practice vocabulary in Spanish, Japanese, French, Korean, Chinese, German, English. Discover 55+ different new languages with Drops! Learn new languages while playing games. You can become fluent, learn vocabulary and common phrases in Hebrew, Arabic, Russian, and Hindi. Set goals, unlock achievements, and get rewards! • Become fluent in a foreign language with this language learning app • Learn to read characters and scripts from different alphabets like Korean, Japanese, Chinese, Hebrew, Arabic, Russian, and Hindi • Custom illustrations for each vocabulary word makes it easy to remember • From beginner to expert levels, grow your foreign language vocabulary • A professionally curated vocabulary list with more than 3,000 words and phrases • Game-like language lessons that make language learning fun and effective • Level up! Track your progress and get rewards • Professional voice artists and sound design with correct dialect pronunciations • Learn to speak languages like Arabic, Chinese (Mandarin), English (British), English (American), French, German, Icelandic, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese (European), Russian, Spanish (Mexican), Spanish (European), Tagalog, Ainu, Arabic (Egyptian), American Sign Language (ASL), Basque, Bosnian, Cantonese, Catalan, Chti, Croatian, Danish, Dutch, Esperanto, Estonian, Finnish, Galician, Greek, Greenlandic, Hawaiian, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Igbo, Indonesian, Irish, Maori, Norwegian, Persian, Polish, Portuguese (Brazilian), Romanian, Samoan, Sanskrit, Serbian, Swahili, Swedish, Swiss German, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian, Vietnamese, Welsh, and even Yoruba! "By focusing on visually appealing games and vocab, Drops aims to lower the barrier preventing users from exploring a new language and, ultimately, accessing the social and economic benefits knowing that language may provide." - TechCrunch We are featured by CNET, Forbes, VentureBeat and many other places too! Try Drops Premium with a 7 day free trial. Download the app to learn about different membership options, and register to learn all about exclusive discounts. Payment will be charged to your iTunes Account at confirmation of Drops premium. Afterwards 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 iTunes Store after purchase. You can cancel your subscription anytime, and you won't be charged in the next billing cycle. Privacy Policy and Terms of Use: http://languagedrops.com/privacypolicy.html
Earworms
Learn languages effectively using the "earworm effect" with catchy music and lyrics. This method anchors foreign language words and phrases into your long-term memory through engaging, brain-based audio-visual lessons. Improve vocabulary and grammar with bite-sized tracks and native speaker pronunciation.
- Learn languages with music and lyrics
- Brain-based learning technique
- Audio-visual experience with karaoke lyrics
- 6-9 minute learning tracks
- Content-rich language based on CEF
- Native speaker pronunciation
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Do you know what “earworm effect” is? Experience it while you learn languages with catchy music and lyrics that you just can't get out of your head. This highly effective award-winning learning technique uses music as the medium to transport words and phrases of a foreign language into your long-term memory. Start your language learning now! Learn Spanish, French, Portuguese, German, Italian, Mandarin, Japanese, Brazilian Portuguese, Maltese, Dutch, Greek, Russian, Arabic, or Turkish and improve your vocabulary and grammar using the power of music. Earworms plant the words of a foreign language into your head with easy language courses. Try our language learning with music lyrics demo for free. THE EARWOMS METHOD 1. Brain-based: The Earworms method not only provides the words, phrases and grammar that you need for language learning, it also actively anchors them into the auditory cortex of your brain! It’s much more than language courses, it's language learning! Learn French, Spanish, English, Italian, German or Dutch listening to music lyrics. 2. Music is the key: Using music as the medium to learn languages is not only fun, it is also effective. Firstly, music puts the learner into the optimum state of consciousness for learning different languages. Secondly, music lyrics learning allows repetition (a prerequisite for language learning). On top of that, music engages and stimulates both hemispheres of the brain, unleashing more learning potential. 3. Chunking: Instead of language learning in terms of individual words and grammar, the Earworms approach immerses the learner in real-life dialogues and expressions with lyrics. These are broken down into bite-size chunks, practiced rhythmically with music and then reconstructed into full sentences. This gives the learner a strong sense of how real language courses are constructed and learning French, Spanish, German, Italian, English and other different languages and their vocabulary becomes easy. IMPORTANT FEATURES * Developed by language teaching experts. * Convenient. 6-9 minute tracks. Listen and learn track by track, any time, anywhere. * Audio-visual experience with 'karaoke-like' live lyrics feature. * Specific unambiguous goals. 200+ optimally selected sets of words and phrases for language learning. * Measurable. Easy tracking of progress of your language courses. * Target language spoken by native speakers - so correct pronunciation is acquired automatically. * Relevant. Carefully chosen content-rich language. Based on the CEF (Common European Framework) and immediately useful to the learner. * Time-bound. The musical memory method enables real rapid progress. E.g. you can learn to count up to 999 in Mandarin in an hour (!) or retain and recall words, phrases and structures in one language level within a couple of weeks. * Educational discounts are available. Visit https://www.earwormslearning.com/edu LANGUAGES CURRENTLY AVAILABLE French + German + Italian + Spanish (European) + Spanish (Lat. American) + Mandarin + Cantonese + Japanese + Arabic + Portuguese (European) + Portuguese (Brazilian) + Russian + Greek + Turkish + Polish + English + Dutch LEVELS There are 3 learning levels available, which will take you up to intermediate level (CEF level A2). * Volume 1. Within a few hours of listening to this volume, you'll have enough vocabulary knowledge of a language to be able to deal with real-life situations like taking a taxi, at the hotel, at the restaurant, requesting, polite phrases, finding your way, numbers, dealing with problems and so on. * Volume 2. This language course will soon have you talking about yourself, chatting and even flirting! * Volume 3. Here you learn more useful everyday situations while going more into the structure, the grammatical rules of the language while improving your vocabulary. NB. The app includes a demo album, full tracks of all languages available – and is free to download. You can then in-app purchase full courses.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is ads: Earworms at none against Drops's shown. Earworms also leads on iOS requirement (12.4 vs 17.6). Drops's advantage is update cadence (weekly vs every 5 months) and ratings volume (72K vs 357). On price, rating, review sentiment 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
Both are free to download. Drops sells 13 in-app purchases, starting at $7.99 per month and Earworms sells 16 one-off in-app purchases. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.7 for Drops against 4.8 for Earworms. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Drops has 72K ratings behind it against 357, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews are what separate them: 75% of Drops's written reviews are positive against 71% of Earworms's.
Drops ships an update weekly, Earworms every 5 months. The most recent releases landed on September 24, 2026 and September 19, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Drops | Earworms |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.7 (72K ratings) | 4.8 (357 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 74.6% of reviews — better | 71.2% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 72K — better | 357 |
| Update frequency | Weekly — better | Every 5 months |
| Ads | Yes | No — better |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Free with in-app purchases |
| Best chart rank | #170 — better | — |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad, iPod — better |
| Requires iOS | 17.6 | 12.4 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 191 MB | 48 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | PLANB LABS OU | earworms Ltd |
Customer experience
Drops
Earworms
User reviews
Drops
From 72K App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 🚀 Vocabulary learning
- 👍 Unique and engaging learning activities
- 👍 Wide range of languages
- 👍 Customizable learning experience
- 👍 Effective for building vocabulary
Room to improve
- 🐛 Inaccurate translations or pronunciations
- 🔒 Subscription model issues
- 👎 Limited to vocabulary, lacks grammar/sentence structure
- 👎 Repetitive and not enough variety in exercises
Earworms
From 357 App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 🎵 Music-based learning method effectively reinforces memory
- 👍 Easy and intuitive to use
- ⭐ Excellent customer support team
- 🎯 Practical, conversational phrases for real-world use
- 🧠 Words and phrases stick in memory effortlessly
Room to improve
- 🐛 Frequent app crashes and freezing issues
- 📱 Poor booklet formatting on mobile devices
- 💸 Pricing considered expensive by some users
- ❌ Limited number of lessons per language
- 🔧 App lacks autoplay/continuous playback feature
Bugs and requests
Drops
Reported bugs
2 issues- Login issues and lost progress
- Crashes and performance problems
Requested features
5 requests- Add more grammar and sentence-level learning
- Improve accuracy of translations and pronunciations
- Provide more flexibility in time limits and review sessions
- Integrate more conversational practice
- Improve user interface and navigation
Earworms
Reported bugs
11 issues- App crashes every few minutes on iPhone
- Network error on startup despite internet connection
- Infinite loop on initial setup screen
- App closes unexpectedly during playback
- Restore purchases feature not functioning
Show 6 moreShow fewer
- Activation code cannot be claimed in app
- Tracks download corrupted or fail to load
- Text display shows English instead of native script
- Phrase book download button subscribes to email instead
- App no longer works after OS updates
- Category selection feature removed in newer version
Requested features
11 requests- Additional volume levels for existing languages
- More lessons and expanded content library
- Autoplay feature for continuous listening
- Repeat single track functionality
- Ability to select specific lesson categories
Show 6 moreShow fewer
- Business-focused lesson modules
- Emergency/medical/police interaction lessons
- Grocery shopping and tradesperson lessons
- More Cantonese, Maltese, Hindi, and Finnish content
- Improved booklet formatting and accessibility
- Direct email contact option for support
In-app purchases
Drops
- Genius for a month$7.991 Month
- Premium$9.991 Month
- Premium$11.991 Month
Show 9 moreShow fewer
- Premium$14.991 Month
- Curious for a month$22.991 Month
- Holiday premium!$39.991 Year
- Premium7 Days trial$62.991 Year
- Premium7 Days trial$69.991 Year
- All Language Learning Plans7 Days trial$69.991 Year
- Premium7 Days trial$79.991 Year
- Premium7 Days trial$89.991 Year
- Premium7 Days trial$99.991 Year
- Unlimited time for all Languages!$59.99
Earworms
- Try before you buyFree
- Essayez avant d’acheterFree
- Álbum de demostraciónFree
Show 13 moreShow fewer
- French Vol. 1$11.99
- Italian Vol. 1$11.99
- Spanish Lat. Am. Vol. 1$11.99
- Portuguese Vol.1$11.99
- French Vol. 2$11.99
- Dutch Vol. 1-2$19.99
- Japanese Vol. 1-2$19.99
- Spanish Lat. Am. Vol. 1-3$27.99
- Bundle deals, French Vol. 1-3$28.99
- Bundle deals, German Vol. 1-3$28.99
- Bundle deals, Italian Vol. 1-3$28.99
- Bundle, Spanish Eu. Vol. 1-3$28.99
- Portuguese Vol.1-3$28.99








