Fluent Forever - Language App 12+

Meh... nothing new here, the same problem as every other language app has: teaches you bizarre, random, useless words which you’re never going to use; like abbot and abacus, and stinging nettle?

Why don’t these apps teach you words you actually need to know and use?

Also, all this “new way of learning” and “emotional attachment” seems to be a bit of a gimmick. All it is, is it allows you to choose the image for the flashcards rather than flashcards having an image already assigned.

Finally, what I really, really don’t like about this app, is it doesn’t seem to let you review flashcards from previous lessons??? That seems ridiculous.

I hoped I would be able to build flashcards and add them to my deck for review each day (seems logical), instead I can only create cards and review them for one day before they vanish forever. At least that’s how it seems, which is useless.

Only day two but not what I’d hoped at all. The app is very flash and fancy, but I’m already sick of the guy telling me about himself and his opera background. Developers need to concentrate on the basics of learning and just get that right.

It’s not rocket science. Don’t over complicate it and get the basics right first. A simple app which teaches you useful, everyday words and allows you to review them when you want.

Hi Jack. Thank you for your thorough review. The app does allow for review of previously reviewed flashcards as well as new cards creating during lessons. The cards will appear based on the algorithm that 'learns' from you how well you are progressing with any given session. We'd love to help you with any issues you might be having with the flashcards if this is not happening for you. Please reach out to us at help@fluent-forever.com so we can assist.

They have added some good features recently, such as an audio accompaniment to custom words - this is an excellent feature. Also you can now see your progress on how much is left in the sessions. Next they should add an ability to write your own sentences as well as being able to add the gender to a custom noun.

Despite this there are a few frustrations. The layout of the app seems to be changed every week and it makes little difference to the user experience. Also they’ve got rid of a very useful feature where you can just hold your finger on a sentence and the native translation will appear at the bottom - super quick and easy. Now it’s been removed (unless my app is faulty?) and you have to click a couple of buttons at the top of the page to see it, not the end of the world but when you’re going over 50+ cards per session it can be annoying. Lastly the review sessions used to appear in blocks of 30, 30, 17 for example, however now they are very random e.g 25, 22, 4, 2, 2, 2, 1.

Hello,
Thank you for the updated review. Content updates are some of our biggest builds to push through so it's easier to release them once we have completed a lot of edits, as this produces more desirable results. Updates are on the way and we encourage you to continue using the error reporting feature. Also, if you've not done so already, please contact the help by copying and pasting this link: https://help.fluent-forever.com/hc/en-us/requests/new This is a great way for the team to get issues reported.

This app is a great concept for beginners, but it’s very frustrating to use if you’re at a higher level. Despite selecting ‘advanced’ and that I didn’t need much help with pronunciation, there was no option to skip pronunciation lessons, and all the vocab was extremely basic. When searching for more advanced vocabulary, it became clear that only the basic stuff had been loaded up to the app. Furthermore, some of the word meanings and translations were flawed, and translated in a particular context which didn’t work for many of the example sentences - which would be very confusing for a beginner. The idea of the flash cards is good, with the options to personalise the type of card. But the swipe left/right idea isn’t great, because there’s no option to input the answers - you just have to think of the answer, tap to see if you’re correct, then self grade. It would be much better if you could be graded like on Duolingo. Overall, great concept, especially with the focus on pronunciation. I just can’t waste my time tapping through the information I already have and relearning vocab I learnt age 9.

Hello Alice,
Thank you for your review. For now, yes, we are focused on beginner and lower intermediate levels. More advanced content will come later down the line, and this will include the addition of tutors and the ability to add custom content. We greatly appreciate your feedback and hope you check back with us as we continue to add more exciting things.