Pros & Cons
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- Professional video-based instruction sessions
- Offers an enormous number of languages
- Great tools for finding the right tutor among the many available
- Reasonable pricing
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- Option to buy a single session could be clearer
Preply Specs
| Average Duration of Lesson (Mins) | 50 |
| No. of Languages Offered (Not Incl. English) | 50 |
| Price Includes | One-on-one tutoring |
| Style of Program | Tutoring via video call |
If you're committed to learning a new language, apps alone won't cut it: You need to join a small class or hire an individual tutor. Preply helps you find an instructor in practically any language for a reasonable rate and book one-on-one, video-based sessions. We like how it highlights tutors with teaching certificates and makes it easy to find an appropriate match. But even despite Preply's competitive pricing, tutoring is still more expensive than small class sessions, which you can get from Editors' Choice winner Lingoda (even if it offers fewer languages). If you're not ready to pay for classes or tutoring, try our other Editors' Choice winners: Duolingo is superb for free daily practice, Fluenz provides video instruction alongside interactive exercises, and Rosetta Stone suits complete beginners.
Pricing: Great Rates That Vary by Tutor
On the Preply platform, the tutor decides how much to charge. When you search for tutors, you can set a price minimum and maximum to narrow your results.
The good news is that you can often find very competitive prices. Rates tend to be lower for tutors who live in places with lower costs of living and thus lower average wages. In testing, I opted for a Romanian tutor who charged $40 per session, which is on the higher end for that language; she had very high ratings from other students. (Her rates recently went up to $58 per session, so perhaps she's in demand!)
For comparison, Lingoda's pricing depends on how many classes you buy at once and the language you choose. You should expect to pay anywhere between $12.49 and $22.49 per group class. It also offers one-on-one tutoring, however, starting at around $18.49 per class (if you commit to 40 sessions).
With Preply, you can also filter tutors based on those who have a verified teaching certificate and or who are Super Tutors, meaning they are especially reliable and have high ratings.
Which Languages Can You Learn With Preply?
You can learn nearly any language with Preply, as long as a tutor has signed up to teach it. Preply advertises the following languages: Arabic, Chinese, Czech, Danish, Dutch, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Serbian, Spanish, Swedish, Turkish, Ukrainian, and Urdu. But that's not even the complete list; I searched for languages that aren't highly in-demand and found tutors for Burmese, Georgian, Icelandic, Igbo, Irish, Kazakh, Lao, Mongolian, Tamazight, and more. I worked hard to uncover languages that weren't available (including Cherokee, Dzongkha, Potawatomi, and Tuvan/Tyvan).
You can find American Sign Language tutors on the platform by searching for the term 'sign.' If you prefer a more traditional course structure to one-on-one tutoring, I highly recommend SignIt ASL.
Preply also has tutors who teach other subjects, such as business analytics, computer science, and math.
Tutor Selection: Easy to Find a Good Fit
As you explore potential tutors, you can read a biography of each one, read reviews other learners have written, watch a short video they've recorded, and send them a message. You can also search by what other languages an instructor speaks. For example, you want a Spanish teacher who can explain things to you in French, if the latter language is what you're more comfortable using for instruction. The short videos are useful not only for getting a sense of a tutor's personality, but also whether they have a clear microphone, which is crucial for language learning.
Experienced teachers tend to include notes about what kind of teaching they do and whether they follow a particular curriculum or framework, such as Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR). CEFR is useful if you are switching from another program because you can tell the teacher exactly what level you are at. Some instructors also specialize in test preparation.
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A 25-minute "trial" lesson is available the first time you meet with any tutor. The trials typically cost about half the price of a full session. If you choose not to go forward with that tutor after a lesson, you can get a refund or request a new trial with someone else.
Often, when you purchase sessions, the default option is to buy multiple sessions at a time, such as three $40 sessions for a total of $120. The option to pay for just one session is a little difficult to find, so pay close attention before you check out.
Tutoring Experience: Professional Tone and Kind Instructors
The 50-minute tutoring sessions I tried all felt extremely professional and well-organized. I found a tutor who was kind and patient, but who also didn't let me get away with speaking English. I told her in advance in a message that my Romanian was rusty, but I had spoken it some years ago. During our very first lesson, she insisted on speaking to me in Romanian almost exclusively, which helped reactivate the language, even though it was uncomfortable. Language learning often is uncomfortable. You have to push beyond your limits to actually learn.
My tutor came prepared with PDFs for reading, role-playing, and speaking exercises, such as describing scenes and giving directions. She assigned homework and used it to start the following tutoring session. She was always on time and signed into the platform before me. When we didn't quite finish a lesson before time was up one time, she stayed on the call an extra two minutes to finish.
You might have a different experience with other tutors, however, so I appreciate Preply's tools for selecting an instructor, trying them out, and switching if they aren't a good fit.
Preply vs. Other Language Learning Apps
Preply's one-on-one tutoring gets you listening to and speaking the language you're trying to learn, which is the best way to make progress fast. It's very similar to Rype, another online tutoring marketplace. I haven't tested Rype in a few years, however, and its pricing model has changed significantly. At present, you have to make a payment before you can learn much about how Rype works, which doesn't instill confidence. Preply is far more transparent and welcoming.
What Preply doesn't have that you might want is an accompanying self-paced course (unless you find a tutor willing to share a packet of PDFs with you). In any event, you don't get an interactive app or program to work through. Although that's not necessarily bad, it might not be what you want.
If you want a combination of a course and tutoring, Rosetta Stone is an option. Just keep in mind that it's best for true novices rather than more experienced speakers. It has optional Live Lessons (small group online classes) to practice speaking and interacting. Each class directly ties in with a course you complete in the Rosetta Stone app, so you have to have the app to access the classes. The classes are highly scripted and, in my opinion, boring. I didn't find them as effective as the small classes or tutoring sessions of Lingoda or Preply, respectively.
Fluenz offers live classes, too, though they require a long-term commitment: either 15 hours ($1,815) or 30 hours ($3,277) in 90-minute, one-on-one sessions with a language coach. You can learn through Fluenz's program in tandem with its online software, but it doesn't strictly require it like Rosetta Stone.
Final Thoughts
(Credit: Preply)
Preply
Both a marketplace for tutors and a platform for one-on-one teaching sessions, Preply effectively helps you learn a new language for a relatively affordable price.