Duolingo: Language Lessons Review Analysis
Analyzed May 30, 2026
Duolingo's recent, aggressive monetization strategies—particularly the 'Energy' system and auto-renewing subscriptions without clear warnings—are creating significant user backlash that threatens to overshadow its core, beloved gamified learning experience. While the app remains hugely popular and effective for beginners, a growing number of frustrated free users and even long-term subscribers feel the platform has become 'money hungry,' limiting learning and betraying its mission of accessible education. This friction is a major red flag, reflected in the recent dip in average ratings and a surge of 1-star reviews detailing billing disputes and a crippled free experience.
Rating distribution
The rating distribution is heavily skewed positive, with 5-star reviews making up about 63% of the total, reflecting the app's massive user base and general satisfaction with its core learning model. However, the significant number of 1-star reviews (nearly 12%) is noteworthy and primarily driven by severe frustration with recent monetization changes and billing issues.
Rating trend by year
Review-level analysis below covers the latest 8,648 reviews.
Key themes
The core strength of Duolingo remains its gamified learning experience. Users across all countries love the streaks, leaderboards, daily quests, and rewards, finding them highly motivating. Many beginners and casual learners praise the app for making learning fun, easy, and addictive, leading to real-world progress and confidence.
A massive number of users, particularly on the free tier, strongly dislike the new 'Energy' system that replaced the old 'Hearts' system. They complain that energy depletes even for correct answers, severely limiting daily learning to just one or two lessons. Many feel this change is a cynical tactic to force subscriptions and contradicts the app's educational mission. This is the most common complaint and appears globally across all storefronts (BR, FR, US, DE, GB, etc.).
Users feel the app has become 'money hungry' and 'pay-to-win'. Complaints include an excessive number of ads, constant pop-ups to upgrade to Super or Max, and core learning features being moved behind a paywall. This sentiment is often linked to the frustrating 'Energy' system, with many users feeling they can no longer learn effectively without paying.
Users report a variety of technical issues, including the app frequently crashing mid-lesson (especially on iPad), freezing during exercises (notably in the new Chess feature), progress not saving, and speaking exercises failing to recognize correct pronunciation. These bugs are especially frustrating when they cause a loss of energy, XP, or a streak.
The recent addition of Music, Math, and Chess courses has been widely praised. Users are excited about the new learning opportunities and find them to be a fun and engaging way to acquire new skills, often mentioning that it makes Duolingo a more well-rounded educational platform.
A significant and alarming number of 1-star reviews report being charged for yearly subscriptions after a free trial without the promised reminder. Users from Germany, the UK, Poland, Chile, and the US cite specific amounts (e.g., £89.99, $175, 260 zł) and express outrage at what they perceive as a 'scam' or 'deceptive practice.' Many report difficulty getting refunds from either Duolingo or Apple.
While many find the lessons effective, a segment of users complains about the quality of some courses. Criticisms include repetitive or nonsensical AI-generated sentences, inaccurate translations, and a lack of depth in grammar explanations. Some users are explicitly negative about the replacement of human translators with AI, citing a drop in quality. Other users complain that some language courses (e.g., Russian) are less developed than others (e.g., French, Spanish).
A small but vocal minority of users across various countries (e.g., RO, AR, BR, ID) complain about the inclusion of LGBTQ+ themes in stories and example sentences, labeling it 'woke' or inappropriate for children. A different, smaller group complains about seeing 'pornographic' or inappropriate third-party ads.
Tap a theme to expand. Counts represent reviews mentioning the theme.
Notable reviews
Never usually leave reviews but genuinely annoyed. I was given a free trial of super Duolingo and wasn’t reminded of the expiry before it renewed and now I’m locked in for a year. Overpriced, not worth it. No way of getting the money back and won’t be recommending this app to anyone.
Dali mi miesiąc za darmo i bez przypomnienia skasowali 260 zł (Translation: They gave me a month for free and charged me 260 PLN without reminder.)
You used to be able to practice lessons you have done without energy now you need it it’s a joke there soo money hungry they don’t care about actually helping people learn anymore there just money hungry they need to add this back
This app used to be one of my favourite ways to learn a language. However, they’ve now replaced their staff for AI and the questions have been repetitive, boring. I don’t recommend it
I’ve been a daily user for a little more than 9 years and am cancelling my subscription... The rampant cheating on the leaderboard is exhausting and the steady decline in accuracy in translation is not worth paying for this.
The app crashes in the middle of a lesson nearly every day. And when you reopen it, your lives have been used up but no progress so when you restart your lesson... you need to purchase more energy to do it. Very disappointed at it seems like a tactic to get you to spend money with them.
In game is says it will remind you to cancel the free trial but it doesn’t do it. Now it billed me the whole annual price and won’t refund me! WATCH OUT!
Duolingo used to be one of my favourite apps, but is now sadly completely unusable. Most of the time you spend on this app will be spent watching an unbearable amount of ads begging you for money... The nail in Duolingo’s coffin is their new energy system, which ensures users can’t do more than one or two lessons at a time, cutting them off mid round, cancelling all their progress and effectively rendering the app useless.
I teach at a middle school with a large population of Hispanic students (40%). I would like to be able to speak with them and their parents, so I am revisiting the duo lingo app. ...the methodology for teaching me is excellent.
the chess course is SO AMAZING! i can learn chess, beat people in chess. i hope you will use duolingo chess course!
absolute cinema! dude😭🌚 this app is too good that i learned russian, korean, italian, math and a hole lot more! (btw is subbed to your yt channel :3) im on a 62 day streak rn!
I’m a Canadian... and I work a customer service job... after only six days I’m already noticing a significant improvement... Upon receiving some good reviews from Francophone customers for being able to properly talk to them, my manager has informed me that he’s raising my pay if I act as a sort of French translator.
Best feature by far is that you can choose to block apps on your phone until you’ve done your daily lesson - no doom scrolling unless you’ve done your 10min! All on the free version
Feature requests from users
The most frequent user request is to revert the 'Energy' system back to the old 'Hearts' system. Users feel the energy system unfairly punishes learning by depleting even on correct answers, limiting them to 1-2 lessons per day. They preferred the hearts, which only depleted on mistakes, creating a fair challenge rather than an artificial paywall.
Users consistently request the addition of new languages. Highly requested languages include Thai, Tagalog/Filipino, Lithuanian, Persian/Farsi, Albanian, Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian, and Sign Language (ASL/BSL). Many users also want more courses available from their native language (e.g., Dutch from German, Russian from French) instead of defaulting to English.
A segment of users, including paid subscribers, finds the gamification elements (chests, animations, leagues, character interactions) to be childish, distracting, and time-wasting. They request a setting to turn these features off to create a more streamlined and focused learning experience.
Users request the ability to download lessons and use the app offline. This is particularly desired by those who want to learn during their commute on subways or in areas with poor internet connectivity, to ensure their progress is saved and they don't break their streak.
Tap a request to see what users said. Counts are the number of reviews explicitly asking for it.
Recommendations
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