Duolingo Reviews 

I dropped out a few years ago as the game element was overwhelming the learning element; I completed the entire Japanese course from beginning to end and retained NOTHING. Learning through play has evolved into play that looks and feels a bit like learning sometimes.

Then, obviously, they pivoted to AI and there's no coming back. Alternatives exist - I've had moderately good results with Drops, though the app is sluggish on my elderly phone.

The Owl has definitely dropped the ball; all those memes from the glory days, about living in pretend-fear of a stern reminder from Duo, belong to the 2010s - when the balance was right and venture capital wasn't yet feeding the user experience feet-first into a meat grinder to make the line go up.

Duo is impossible to exit or are allowed to reject a family plan!!!

You will not learn a language. They constantly try to get you to upgrade to premium by tricking you. A large amount of what they’re teaching is incorrect. They praise perfection which when you’re learning, it is good to make mistakes to help you learn. Don’t waste your time. Try coffee break languages.

I was on the verge of subscribing to Duolingo, so pleased I checked Trust Pilot first! I'll keep my money this time

AI is broken, falsely accusing innocent test takers, ignoring appeals..
I am writing to formally log a serious complaint regarding my recent Duolingo English Tests. My test results have been unfairly invalidated twice due to flawed AI detection, causing me immense stress, financial loss, and critical delays regarding my university admission deadlines.
In my first test, the system claimed my ears were not visible. In my second test, it falsely accused me of using an external microphone or headset. I state categorically and under full responsibility that I did not use any headset, microphone, or any unauthorized equipment during either exam.
Your automated AI grading system has clearly misdiagnosed my laptop’s internal microphone echo or ambient fan noise as an external device. This is a severe glitch in your software that is punishing an innocent, rule-abiding test taker.
I have already submitted an official appeal, but given the time-sensitive nature of my academic deadlines, I demand the following:
Manual Human Review: I request that a senior Proctoring Supervisor thoroughly reviews my exam video and audio recordings frame-by-frame. A human eye will easily confirm that my ears were clear and absolutely no external devices were present.
Immediate Certification: Once the human verification confirms no violation took place, I demand that my legitimate score be certified and released immediately. I cannot and will not accept a "free retake" because I have no time to go through this stressful process again due to your technical errors.
If this matter is not resolved justly and my valid score is not released, I will be forced to escalate this issue outside of Duolingo by filing an official consumer fraud complaint with the Better Business Bureau (BBB) and initiating a chargeback dispute with my bank for failing to provide the paid service.

I have a 1526 day streak in 4 languages and am not fluent in speaking any of them, but I can read books fairly well. This app was fun initially, but a few months back the graphics started to change. The owl Duo started switching genders, graphics of him bouncing his butt with an emphasis on his bare butt crack, and suggestive sexual innuendos are literally after every challenge. Then the challenge graphics depict actual demons with horns, wings, tails and fangs. It’s really weird because this has never been the case in the years I’ve used this application. Now, you may be wondering why would I use it for so long if it didn’t work and in truth, it was just fun to kill time and a little compulsive to maintain the streak. Then things shifted for me when the app started changing the imagery like it’s pushing subtle cues that feel A LOT like grooming and normalizing inappropriate conduct for kids.

I don’t feel comfortable allowing the children to use the application anymore and have decided to step away and explore some of the competitors myself for less money (and made significant progress in conversations in only a few weeks). I won’t say which because that’s not what this review is about, but that there are few options if you’re interested.

I forgot to unlink my card from the app and was charged $60 for a subscription renewal even though I canceled my profile and uninstalled the program (not cool) and have had zero response from customer service despite filing complaints about all of the listed above concerns. To each their own, but after spending over 4 years using this platform and not actually have any verbal communication skills beyond that of a toddler- I would not recommend. If you value the safety of your kids and oppose grooming and sexualizing children programs- I was also. NOT recommend this application.

I want the Energy/Battery system on the PC Web version just like on mobile

I have been using Duolingo for a number of years. I began with Norwegian while i was living in Norway. Now i live in Germany and am learning German. My enthusiasm for Duolingo decreased when it went through a major redesign a couple of years ago and i actually wrote a complaint somewhere at that time. Recent improvements, however are impressing me like anything so it is only fair that i leave a good review now!! The current German course is super, super excellent!. I love the content. I's great how i have to write (freeform) about a story i just heard, and AI corrects my German. There are now so many great improvements to how duolingo works. I love the humour and entertaining style of the current german content. I feel that Duolingo is now beating youtube videos..teaching me more new things faster. I guess it is good to have a range of language learning options. I have a paid subscription for Duolingo and i wholeheartedly recommend it.

Extremely disappointing experience. Due to serious technical failures on Duolingo's platform, I was unable to receive the service I paid for. Instead of providing meaningful assistance, support repeatedly sent automated AI-generated responses with additional troubleshooting tasks. Every time I completed a requested step, a new one appeared, creating an endless cycle of unpaid work for the customer.

The process consumed significant time and effort and felt more like testing and training their system than receiving actual support. Despite the platform's failure to deliver the purchased service, there was no straightforward path to a refund. Poor customer service, inadequate technical support, and no accountability for a service that was never provided.

I wasn’t the best experience because of constant adds and you have to pay for something that is extremely important so it was unfortunately a bit of a let down.

Their (incessant) ads talk about how you get reminders before your trial ends so you can decide to cancel before you are charged. This is a blantant lie. I got not one reminder before my trial ended and I was charged £65.

If they were in the UK I'd report them to Trading Standards, it's fraud.

Warning,

When accepting their one week free trial, make sure to cancel subscription immediately.

The thieving b4stards will take a yearly subscription without any consent. Yes a yearly subscription, not a weekly or a monthly one, with no notifications or prior agreements to this.

I think it’s a great program but on the chess version, I often need to resign because I get close to check mate and it fails to load causing me to have to restart the app. After doing so, it shows me that I lost when I should have won. Otherwise it’s a great program for practicing new languages. Even with this slight miss function, I’d still recommend it to anyone.

They keep saying I have no streak freezes left even though I clearly have some. This forces me to pay in their currency even though I shouldn't be.

Freezes are also deducted when they shouldn't be. The app and desktop versions don't properly sync, causing chaos for lesson completion, streak freezes and deductions.

Their support team has completely disappeared. "Oscar" their AI support bot is completely useless and never understands what the support issue is.

It's unacceptable to pay for a product and get no response from customer support for weeks (or ever). They should focus on a good product, not growth at all costs. I'm very tempted to leave the platform.

No grammar instruction. All learning deleted.
They have suddenly taken away all grammar instruction and expect people to pick it up by the sentences. You can recognize this on the app and on your main computer but if it comes to real life you will not be able to contruct a sentence
They may be a popular app and course but less than two per cent ever complete the course. I have the feeling that this change to their courses will ensure in their demise.You cannot speak a language without knowing grammar and how to form sentences.
This is and will be a disaster for them.

I have been using Super Duolingo for seven years (2276 days) now! As you can understand I liked the app and can now speak Spanish which I couldn't before. So why a bad rewiev?
In the latest update, there are so many faults : The app freezes, you don't get your extra xp when promised and now THE APP WON'T OPEN I A PAID VERSION!
It is as if there aren't anyone in support of this product.

These pay to use study apps are becoming unbearable.

I took the Duolingo English Test three times. The first two attempts were marked as uncertified. In 2026, after the side-camera rule was implemented, I decided to try again. My third attempt was initially certified with a score of 105.

However, after 10 days, I received an email stating that my result had been uncertified and that my account had been blocked. I appealed the decision and requested evidence explaining why my result was invalidated, but no evidence was provided.

As a result, I lost money on my university application and embassy-related expenses. This experience was very disappointing and caused significant stress. Based on my personal experience, I would recommend considering other English proficiency tests such as IELTS, TOEFL, or PTE.

This review reflects my own experience with the Duolingo English Test. Dont waste time and money.

I like Duolingo but it does have issues. I was ill so lost my over one thousand day streak. I paid to repair it and got absolutely nothing. Writing to them generated a polite acknowledgement but stated I was unlikely to get a reply and I didn’t. About3- 4 months later they offered to repair my streak for free if I did another three lessons so what did I pay for? In any case I still then lost over 100 days. I paid for their family and friends membership. It said I could learn with up to five family and friends for £60 a year. I signed up but what they didn’t make clear was that the family or friend must also be a paid up member. What’s the point of adding them if they are already a paid up member? It’s a money making exercise if you ask me and once they have your money there is no way they are giving it back. You can buy gems if you need them but again it’s all about money. When doing flashcards they take too long to turn to the next one leaving it to a whisker of a second too late then you have to use up hundreds of gems just to say one word. Then today after doing 30 min of flashcards it didn’t even add the points on. So at 136 approx every 1-2 min atlevel 13, I lost a lot of points. I’ve also noticed recently that some of the French word exercises were plain wrong. So OK Duolingo has been my favourite go to app for 3 or four years but I’m tired of the glitches now. And their triple points score has been all over the place many many times over.

I have been using Duolingo for several years and I have learned a lot, but they have clearly abandoned their goal of helping people learn and are focused more on making money. My most recent pet peeve is that they place posts on my feed from random strangers. It wastes so much of my time to weed through these posts to see posts from actual friends and it appears there is no way to stop it. I don’t care if Joe Blow had 50k likes on a sentence! I should be engaged in the app because I am enjoying it, not because I am forced to waste my time! It seems they have no respect for their users.