20 Best Apps to Learn French in 2026 (Free, Tested)

The best app to learn French depends on what you need: Speak if you want to talk from the first lesson, Babbel if you want grammar explained like a teacher would, Duolingo or the free TV5MONDE app if you want to start for nothing, Pimsleur for the car, and Slova if you want French built around your own goals and interests.

French has an easy start and a stubborn middle. You can read a menu within weeks, then a waiter answers at full speed: letters go silent, words run together and every noun has a gender. How long French takes depends less on the app you pick than on how much of it you say out loud and hear at real speed.

We compared 20 apps, free and paid, and checked every price and free plan in October 2026. This is not a ranking. Every app has a "best for" label, so find the line that sounds like you. The first twelve get a full review, and eight more are under "More apps worth knowing".

Comparison table

✓Yes◐Partly✕No

How we tested

Between September and October 2026 we put every app through the same checks, starting on the free plan or trial and moving to a paid plan only where a feature needs one. Prices, free limits and language lists come from each app's own pages or its US App Store listing, checked in October 2026. Store ratings are US App Store ratings from 8 October 2026.

We judged every app on the same five things:

• Speaking and correction. How much of a session you spend talking, whether mistakes are caught, and whether you are told why.
• Course and grammar. Whether there is a path from beginner level, and whether French grammar is explained or only drilled.
• Listening. Whether you hear French at real speed, with liaisons and dropped sounds, or only slow and clear voices.
• Word review. Whether the words you meet are saved and come back on a schedule.
• Free plan and price. What you get without paying, and what a month and a year cost.

For the twelve full reviews we then ran the same three tasks, so the notes are comparable:

1. The correction task. A ten-minute spoken roleplay ordering a coffee, with three planned slips: a wrong gender (la café), a wrong verb form (j'ai allé for je suis allé) and a swallowed liaison (vous avez said as two separate words). We noted which slips were caught, whether the app interrupted or waited, and whether it gave a reason.
2. The memory task. We met ten new words in the app, then came back 24 hours later without searching for them. Did they return in a review, or were they gone?
3. The goal task. We started as a beginner with a real reason, a job interview in Montréal or a favourite film, and looked at what week one offered, what the free version allowed and what the first bill would be.

The eight apps under "More apps worth knowing" got a lighter check: we read their pricing and help pages, opened the free version where there is one, and ran the first and third tasks if the app allowed it.

Every app gets 0, 1 or 2 points on each of the five criteria. This is the rubric:

In the comparison table a tick is 2 points, a half mark is 1 and a cross is 0. We do not add the marks into a league table, because an audio course scores low on speaking and is still the best thing to play on a drive.

The 12 detailed reviews

The numbers on the cards are only the order on the page. Read the label after each name and the "watch out" line. Prices in the facts lines are US App Store prices checked in October 2026, unless the line names another source.

3

Slova

Best for learning French through your own life and interests

Slova starts with one sentence about why you want French, and the reason can be a goal, an interest or both. A goal is a job in Lyon, a move to Montréal, a partner's family in Marseille or a DELF certificate. An interest is the thing you already love: football, French cinema, cooking, rap, fashion. Most people have both, and Slova uses both. It asks a few questions written for your topic, then builds a path of units and lessons around you, with the vocabulary, grammar and conversation all living inside it.

The path keeps evolving with you. When you finish the last unit it extends itself, and it changes as your goals, interests and level change, so the content never stops being about you. Behind it sits a real A0 to C2 curriculum, built by language learners and computer scientists, with visual lessons. Every lesson can be done two ways: as interactive slides with pictures, audio and quick checks at your own pace, or out loud with our AI tutors, who listen to your answers and correct you with the reason. You learn French by speaking it.

Everything you meet lands in one place. Every word, verb and phrase from lessons, tutor talks, pictures, podcasts and texts goes into the Lexicon, with where you met it and how well you know it, and it comes back for review. You can import words you already know. You can also make your own practice: describe a bakery or a stadium and Slova draws the scene and labels each object in French, ask for a podcast, audio lesson or story at your level with a transcript that follows the audio, or rehearse a role-play where an AI tutor plays the other person and corrects as you speak.

Here is why that matters for French. The word you learn today is one you use tomorrow, because it comes from your own life: le but and le hors-jeu if you follow football, le fouet and la pâte feuilletée if you bake, l'entretien and le CDI if you are job hunting in Lyon. That is what makes results feel fast and practical, and why people keep opening it in week six, when a course written for everyone starts to feel like homework. A correction sounds like this: you say la pâte est prêt, and the tutor says prête, because pâte is feminine.

GoodBuilt around your own goals and interests, so the words you learn today are the ones you use tomorrow, with every lesson available out loud and one Lexicon for everything you meet.

Watch outNewer than Duolingo or Babbel, with 12 languages today rather than 40. If you only want a quick drill with no goal behind it, a lighter app is simpler.

• English, French, Spanish, Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, German, Italian, Russian and Turkish, and growing
• A0 to C2 curriculum
• Every lesson can be done out loud with our AI tutors
• One Lexicon for every word you meet

More apps worth knowing

These eight got the lighter check, and each is live in October 2026 and best at one thing.

• Memrise (best for hearing real French speakers on video). Short clips of native speakers saying everyday phrases, with spaced review. Its Pronunciation Buddy lets English speakers record a phrase and hear whether to try again, for French and nine other languages, and Memrise's blog calls it free to use [18]. The App Store lists $24.99 a month, $61.99 a year (about $5.17 a month) and a $329.99 lifetime plan. Little grammar. See Memrise vs Duolingo.
• Mondly (best for short lessons in many languages). Short lessons with word-and-picture matching, scripted conversations and a chatbot with voice recognition in Premium. The App Store lists $15.90 a month or $74.90 a year, both with a one-week trial. Think of it as a cheap, broad starter, not a place to reach fluency.
• Clozemaster (best for filling vocabulary gaps in real sentences). Fill-in-the-blank sentences ordered by how common the missing word is, with a free version and a Pro plan that the App Store lists from $8.99 to $12.99 a month and $69.99 to $79.99 a year. It suits B1 and above.
• Anki (best free flashcards that you build yourself). Spaced-repetition flashcards, free on desktop and on Android, and $24.99 once on iPhone. There are shared French decks, but you or a deck supply the cards, and it teaches nothing by itself.
• HelloTalk (best for chatting with native French speakers). A language-exchange app: you text and talk with native speakers who want your English. Free members get 10 translations a day and VIP removes the limit [19]. The quality depends on your partner, so it is practice, not a course.
• italki (best for a human tutor by the lesson). Tutors set their own prices, lessons start at $4 and there is no subscription, with both community tutors and professional teachers and trial lessons [20]. It is the best way to rehearse a DELF speaking test with a real person.
• Coffee Break French (best free podcast course for a commute). Radio Lingua's lessons run 15 to 20 minutes, with 40 lessons in a season, and Season 1 starts from zero. The audio is free; its paid Coffee Break Academy adds lesson notes, transcripts and quizzes.
• Language Transfer (best free audio course that explains the logic). A free course funded by donations, built on a method it calls the Thinking Method. Its French course is listed as an introduction, not a complete course.

Best free apps to learn French

For most people the best free app to learn French is Duolingo for habit and TV5MONDE for real French video, both free from the first lesson. Here is where each free plan stops, checked on each app's own pages in October 2026.

Speak, Pimsleur, Rosetta Stone and Lingopie have trials, not free plans. A free start that works: first words in Duolingo, real video in TV5MONDE, the logic of French in Language Transfer, then a real conversation on HelloTalk, following our plan for learning French by yourself.

The fastest way to learn French

No app makes French fast on its own, and anyone who says one does is selling you a streak. What changes the speed is the number of hours you spend saying French and hearing it at real speed. The apps below just make those hours easier to find.

A routine that works for most adults, in this order:

1. Talk every day, 20 minutes. Speak, Praktika or a Slova tutor lesson out loud. Speaking is the skill that apps replace worst with tapping.
2. Listen for 30 minutes. Pimsleur or a podcast on the commute, a TV5MONDE video at lunch, a show on Lingopie in the evening. Your ear needs French faster than you can read it.
3. Review on a schedule. Use the Lexicon in Slova, Review in Babbel, or Anki, so a word you met on Monday returns on Wednesday and not never.
4. See a human once a week. A 30-minute lesson on italki finds the mistakes an AI is too polite to correct.

Speed also comes from choosing words you will use: your job, your flat, your hobby first. That is why a path built around your own life feels faster than a generic one. Our guide to the best apps to learn a language fast covers the method.

For beginners and adults

If you are starting from zero, Duolingo, Babbel and Speak are the gentlest first weeks. Duolingo costs nothing, Babbel explains why things work, and Speak has you saying your first sentence in the first minute. TV5MONDE's A1 path adds real French video for free. Our list of the best language apps for beginners covers that first month.

Adults learn differently from children, and the apps that suit them know it:

• You have 15 minutes, not an hour. Pick an app whose lesson fits a coffee break: Duolingo, Babbel or Busuu lessons are all short.
• You want the reason, not the rule list. Babbel and Kwiziq explain why a sentence works, which adults tend to prefer to guessing.
• You want to use it on Friday. Adults stay with French when it connects to a job (see French for work), a trip or a person. Slova builds the whole path from that reason, and Speak and Praktika let you rehearse a real situation.
• You are nervous about speaking. Start with an AI tutor that never loses patience, then move to a person.

Start with polite French. Use vous with people you do not know and tu with friends, children and when the other person says on se tutoie. Every app teaches this differently, so check that yours does.

Learning French in the car

Audio is the best use of dead time, and French rewards it, because the language is easier to hear wrong than to read wrong. These are the options that need no screen once you press play:

• Pimsleur. Thirty-minute lessons where you answer out loud. A full audio course, with 150 lessons in French.
• Coffee Break French. A free podcast with 15 to 20 minute lessons, in seasons of 40.
• Language Transfer. Free audio that teaches French by explaining how it fits together, in an introductory course.
• A Slova podcast or audio lesson. You can ask for a podcast, audio lesson or story on your topic at your level, with a transcript that follows the audio, and listen on the road.

Set the lesson up before you drive. Voice-first apps like Speak and Praktika want your phone in your hand, so save them for the evenings. Try one audio course for two weeks, and see our Pimsleur review for how it works.

French conversation apps

For a French conversation app, the real question is what kind of correction you can stand. A tutor that interrupts feels harsh, and one that never corrects teaches you nothing.

• Speak is the most structured: roleplays inside a course, and Free Talk with characters you can interrupt.
• Praktika gives you a visible tutor and a dial for how strict the feedback is.
• Langua gives the most detailed report on what you got wrong, after the call.
• Slova lets you do every lesson out loud with our AI tutors and rehearse role-plays where a tutor plays the other person and corrects as you speak, on a path built around your goals and interests.
• Busuu, Duolingo and Babbel each have an AI conversation feature, on the top plan, on Video Call and in a beta.
• HelloTalk and italki are the human options, free to chat on HelloTalk and paid by the lesson on italki.

AI is patient and available at midnight. It is also polite, so it can let an odd sentence through: add one real conversation a week. Our guide to the best apps for speaking practice compares the voice apps in more detail.

French pronunciation

French pronunciation is hard in a way that spelling hides. Final consonants are silent, so ils parlent is said like il parle. Words link, so vous avez sounds like one word, and je ne sais pas often becomes something like chépa in fast speech. There are nasal vowels with no English twin, as in un bon vin blanc, and a throaty r.

What helps, in order of strength: Pimsleur and Speak make you say phrases and repeat them. Rosetta Stone's TruAccent and Praktika's word-by-word score tell you which sound was off. Memrise's Pronunciation Buddy gives a quick right-or-try-again check. Slova's tutors listen to you answer out loud and correct you with the reason. Whatever you use, listen first, say it, then listen again at full speed.

DELF, DALF and French exams

The French exams you will meet are the DELF, which covers A1 to B2, and the DALF, which covers C1 and C2. They are run by France Éducation international, they test listening, reading, writing and speaking, and the diplomas are valid for life [17]. A university, a visa or an employer will usually name the level they want. Fees and dates are set by the exam centre, so ask the centre before you plan.

What can an app do for an exam? No app on this list claims DELF preparation that we could confirm. TV5MONDE's free app has TCF practice tests and a simulator, and TCF is a different exam from the DELF. Busuu follows CEFR levels, and Duolingo's score is not a DELF result. Use an app for the French itself, then work through the official sample papers on the exam body's own site, and book a few mock speaking sessions with a tutor on italki.

Other than Duolingo

Most people leave Duolingo for one of five reasons. Our page of Duolingo alternatives goes deeper.

• You want to speak. Speak or Praktika, and Slova if you want the lessons themselves out loud.
• You want grammar explained. Babbel or Kwiziq French. Babbel vs Duolingo compares the first.
• You want French that fits your life. Slova builds the path around your goals and interests together.
• You want less game and more audio. Pimsleur or Rosetta Stone.
• You want to stay free. TV5MONDE, Busuu's free plan and Language Transfer cost nothing.

Best app by goal

Which one should you pick

If you are starting from nothing and want to spend nothing, begin with Duolingo and TV5MONDE, then add a speaking app after a month. If you freeze when you talk, Speak and Praktika put the most French in your mouth. If you want to understand how the language works, Babbel is the clearest teacher and Kwiziq finds your gaps.

If you drive or walk a lot, Pimsleur turns that time into French, and Lingopie gives your ear real speed in the evening. If you are around B1 and want long conversations, try Langua.

If you are learning French for something specific, a job in Brussels, a move to Montréal, a partner's family in Marseille, a love of French food or football, Slova is the one we would start with: it builds the lessons, the speaking practice and the word review around that one reason, and it keeps changing as your reason does. Whichever you pick, spend one real week on the free plan or trial first.

Conclusion

French rewards a good first month: polite phrases first, your mouth in the lessons from the start, and your ear on real speed as soon as you can follow simple sentences. Start free with Duolingo and TV5MONDE, then pay for the one thing you are missing. Speak leads for speaking and Babbel for grammar, and Pimsleur makes a commute count. If you want one course built around your goals and interests, with every lesson available out loud, give Slova a try.

Frequently asked questions

Sources

Written by Yiğit Karasu, founder of Slova