Drops: Language Learning 4+

This app is the greatest thing to happen to language learning ever. Seriously. I’ve been studying one language or another my entire life and have never looked forward to vocab drills before. I actually get excited about getting to do my Drops review every evening. It’s fantastic. Right now I’m using it to tackle Mandarin Chinese and it’s incredibly helpful for learning the characters. The sounds are paired with the characters (or words) so you have a “See & Say” learning experience, which is the best way to learn. The system is smart and shuffles back to the ones you flubbed on recently so you can practice them more. It also has an immediate reinforcement after you make a mistake so that the correct answer is cemented in your brain. Many of the other apps don’t do that, leaving you to wonder “then what WAS the right answer!?” This app reinforces the correct answer immediately. Clearly the developers know a thing or two about the language learning curve. One thing to remember - learning any language is hard. You’ll have places where you struggle. That’s where an app like this can help so much. Even if you feel like you’re just repeating the same cards over and over (and making errors), you ARE learning. Stick with it and don’t give up! But honestly, download this app already. You’re here because you’re serious about learning that new language, and this is the way to do it!

Hi, Thanks for choosing Drops to learn Mandarin Chinese, and taking the time to write us such a nice, positive review! We're thrilled to hear you like the app, and your kind words are much appreciated! Keep playing and let us know if you would suggest us anything to refine or improve! :)

I've been using drops for about three weeks now, specifically to leisurely learn Japanese. I have the "genius" subscription (about $8 a month--I think--for unlimited use). I've found it to be a fun and convenient way to build my vocabulary. In the Japanese section there are over a 1000 words available, so there's plenty of material. After introducing a word, the app gives a good mix of entertaining matching, spelling, etc. drills to help cement the word. For Japanese, there's two difficulty settings: beginner (only hiragana) and intermediate (katakana and kanji). There's also an option to have romaji subtitles. I've found the beginner setting great for working on basic pronunciation and the intermediate good for getting familiar with kanji. In the beginner setting, there's a hiragana section in which you can get familiar with all the symbols (which I loved). There isn't a section for voiced hiragana or voiced katakana, but there are other flash card-style apps available for the syllabaries, so it's not a huge issue. The app has a dojo section in which you can practice all the words you've reviewed together. I've really liked it as a way of gauging my progress. For me, the dojo always crashes on the intermediate setting, but when I contacted drops about it they replied right away, and I'm confident they'll fix it. Overall, I think this is a great app and I definitely recommend it.

Hi Ted, We're really happy to hear you like Drops, and you would recommend it! Thanks for sending us such a detailed, positive feedback! We keep trying to improve the app and its content. Comments like this from our users are definitely much appreciated. :)

I took Japanese in college and was always so terrible with vocab. I have forgotten so much and I’ve been wanting to get back into it, so I tried this app, and I feel like I know more vocab now than I did when I was taking classes! Drops makes it simple and fun to learn, and is perfect in conjunction with Duolingo or teaching yourself the grammar. I do have one issue with how Japanese words are ‘broken up’ when you have to spell them using the bubbles; I’m sure all words in all languages are broken up in the same way, but at least for Japanese it feels really off putting because it goes against the way the Japanese alphabet is organized and how you should be pronouncing things properly. I think it would be easier and less confusing if you customized the way certain languages get broken up to follow the correct structure (Japanese is usually sets of two letters or just a vowel/n so if you broke up ‘konpyuutaa’ as ‘konp’ ‘yuut’ ‘aa’ it just feels wrong, and should be something like ‘kon’ ‘pyuu’ ‘taa’ etc etc). I haven’t purchased yet but I’m thinking about it, my only reservation is that the five minute chunks and having to wait basically a full day to come back to it makes me more disciplined! If I had endless time I’m afraid I wouldn’t be as diligent. We’ll see, but in the mean time, thank you for this amazing app!

Hi, Thanks for choosing Drops to strengthen your Japanese vocabulary, and sending us feedback! We constantly work hard on improving the app and the content, including the spelling games, so please stay tuned! Keep playing and let us know if there’s anything else you would suggest us to improve on!