First I would like to say thank you to my new friends at 小红书 for directing me to try this app. This has been the easiest and most enjoyable way I have ever learned a new language. I tried duo lingo first which was fun and all but learning different food items when learning a new language is not going to help all that much with communication. Hello Chinese has EVERYTHING that you need to truly learn, truly teaches you about word and sentence structure and shows you HOW to communicate, they even have it set it up so that you can practice and be critiqued on the way that you are saying words so that you know how to fix it. I really love that Hello Chinese has actual people involved in the making of this app. Hearing native speakers use their native language really helps. This app also stays true to the culture and that in its self makes it the best out there. I 1000% recommend. I bought the subscription as I have a goal to be fluent in 1 year, and so far I think that is very obtainable. If you don’t have the extra funds at the time however, it still teaches you everything you need to know for no cost. I don’t ever leave app reviews but Hello Chinese is great and they deserve to be #1 for language learning done correctly.

After using this app for about 7 months, I can say that I love using it. I’ve taken classes and made many Chinese friends throughout my language learning journey and HelloChinese played a pivotal role in helping me learn basic grammar and understand the cultural nuances of the language. My favorite feature of the app right now is the stories, which I read every night. Once you reach a proficiency level where you can read them without needing to constantly translate, it becomes addictive, and a great way to practice too. In fact I like this feature so much that I’m scared of running out of stories. This app is very user friendly and has many features. One thing I would like to be changed is the weekly limit on the Immerse lessons. Once you complete the main lessons, the Immerse lessons are like extra content. I don’t want to pay monthly for the app just for the immerse lessons to be locked for use only once a week. I also wish there were more badges to earn and maybe a leaderboard of some kind for the games. I do appreciates that this app prioritizes accurate teachings of Chinese over gamifying the app, but some extra game like features in the games category would be a fun way to incentive you to play them. The only reason I don’t give this app 5 stars is because the limit on the Immerse lessons annoy me. Other than that, this app is the best and easiest to use Chinese language learning app.

HelloChinese is a fun, easy to follow program. You're given a variety of options to adjust the level of difficulty, as well as many supplemental learning tools such as flash cards, games, videos. It covers all the aspects of the Chinese language, including but not limited to proper pronunciation, reading both pinyin and traditional characters, as well as writing/typing pinyin and traditional characters. There is an achievement point system that allows you to access more content, and there is something satisfying about working my way down the curriculum path. I'd recommend this app to anyone wanting to learn to read, speak and write in Chinese. ETA (2021): I’ve returned to HelloChinese after a long hiatus and was glad to see there was a new, more comprehensive course available. However, they have done away with the games section for the new course and according to support there are no plans to reintroduce it. This is false advertisement considering that the Premium subscription claims that you have unlimited access to all training games. You can access the games still, but in order to play them you have to progress in the old course (which is redundant to and goes in a different order from the new course). That’s a huge limitation if you ask me, not to mention a huge inconvenience. The games were a big part of why I used to love this app, so my new rating and amended review is going to reflect that.

This app has made MANYYY improvements over the years and I still find it so effective. I started young, learning mandarin through public schooling and always considered myself a fast learner. I studied almost all school years. After graduating, I found myself significantly worse at pronunciation, some struggles with grammar and even response in dialogue. Thanks to this app, not only have I recovered all my degraded skills, but I’ve learned many new measure words to join terms with other terms that make sense in Mandarin dialogue. Thank you to the team that has made this app free for those who download out of curiosity and providing your paid option for those that wish to take it to the next level. I’ve managed to read some of the stories (which are HSK level based! HUGE PLUS!!) to continuously challenge yourself on each level and feel more comfortable with your progression as well as indulge deeper immersion by watching the learning videos to truly understand the difference in tone through dialogue and speech speed. This app is amazingggg and using it will definitely help you learn mandarin basics and create conversation comfortably. I highly encourage!!