How This Expert-Designed App Gets Complete Beginners Speaking A New Language In 3 Weeks

Over 100 language experts are currently beavering away at Babbel HQ to develop the best language-learning app ever. Over one million active subscribers are already convinced. So who are these people and what are they doing so right?

Just how many people does it take to create a range of award-winning language courses? At Babbel, we have a team of over 100 linguists and language experts working together on one floor of our Berlin office. It’s probably one of the most multilingual places on Earth. Sitting beside an Italian who speaks Russian, French, German, English and Finnish is a German who speaks Spanish, Portuguese and English. And they’re all learning other languages, of course.

Aside from seeing just how many polyglots Babbel can fit in one room, there is a more serious aim to this: to tailor outstanding language courses that get you speaking your new language as quickly as possible — so quickly, in fact, that a recent study showed that even beginners just starting out in a new language only need an average of 15 hours of study over a two-month period to cover the requirements for one college semester. So how do they do this? Let’s take a look.

1. Our language experts tailor courses for your native language

The Babbel app is available in seven languages: English, Spanish, French, German, Portuguese, Italian and Swedish. From these seven languages, you can choose to learn any one of 13 languages. That makes for over 90 language combinations, and Babbel needs to be able to accommodate for all of them. Why? Let’s take a simple example. As an English speaker learning German, you won’t need as much help translating the verbs bringen and singen as the average Spanish speaker, whose verbs traer and cantar bear no resemblance to their German counterparts.

Every Babbel course is developed with your native language at the very forefront of the developer’s mind. We know you’ve already learned at least one language successfully — your native language — so we build on the grammatical concepts that you’ve already mastered and gently introduce the new ones.

2. They design courses to get you speaking as soon as possible

You all probably know the Eddie Izzard sketch where he effortlessly recites phrases from his school days: “The mouse is under the table and the monkey is on the branch.” Like most good comedy, it’s funny because it’s true. Generations of language learners can sympathize with the unfortunate predicament of being able to successfully construct semi-functional sentences (if you’re in a French zoo), but still struggle to complete basic daily tasks such as buying a bottle of water in a shop.

At Babbel, we believe that keeping oneself hydrated is more important than discerning the location of monkeys, so we avoid drilling abstract grammar and vocabulary, and focus on real-life dialogue. After the first course you’ll be able to introduce yourself, talk about where you’re from, how you’re doing, how you got to wherever you are, and — most importantly — say what you’d like to drink. In fact, if you’re bored of reading English, you can get started in your language of choice here. Select Spanish and you could be ordering sangria at your local tapas bar by this time tomorrow (unless you’re reading this at breakfast time, in which case, I recommend you go for the huevos rotos con papas fritas — ¡te echo de menos, amigo!)