Summary: According to FSI, if you spend 3 hours per day learning Spanish, you'll achieve fluency in around six months. Reduce your Spanish time to one hour a day and, according to FSI, it will take about 1.5 years to learn. As you can see, Spanish is one of the most accessible languages for English speakers.
Yes, you can become fluent in Spanish in a year if you're good at languages and dedicate many hours of studying per day. However, fluency usually requires at least 1.5 years, if not 2-3 years.
If you start out as a beginner and manage to spend an average of 1 hour per day working on your Spanish, you should be able to reach conversational fluency within 8 – 12 months. That translates to about 250 – 350 hours spent.
The next and most accurate answer is that it can take anywhere between three months to two years to learn how to speak, write, and read in a new language fluently.
If you're starting from scratch, you could reach this level of fluency in 1 year by studying for 2 – 3 hours per day. If you're already at an intermediate level, you could get there in about 6 months. If this sounds intense, don't worry – this doesn't mean hours of “school-like” studying from grammar books.
It may be challenging at times, but you are never too old to learn a language.
Duolingo can't make you fluent by itself
But there are two sides to any learning process: Active and Passive. Duolingo nails the active but offers very little in respect of the passive.
And structural plasticity is when your brain changes its structure due to learning. It's strongly believed that once we hit 25, the brain's plasticity solidifies. This makes it harder to create neural pathways. In turn, this can mean it's tougher to learn new skills.
However, most colleges require a minimum of two years of a foreign language to be considered for admission. Many colleges recommend at least three years of the same world language in high school for a student to be competitive in the admissions pool.
No matter how old you are, you're never too old to learn a new language. However, because your brain's ability to adapt and change decreases over time, you'll probably have to practice more.
After using the Duolingo app and thoroughly testing this program out, our team's consensus is that Duolingo isn't great for learning Spanish. Duolingo has some serious limitations, and we see it more as an e-learning tool or supplement than a comprehensive program if you want to truly learn Spanish.
The more time you dedicate to studying and practicing Spanish each day, the faster you will get through those learning hours. If you're wondering how much time I think you should spend learning Spanish, I suggest you set aside at least 60-90 minutes each day for dedicated Spanish learning.
Based on the data in our courses: If you learn Spanish by yourself, focus on learning chunks native Spanish speakers use, and you commit to studying 30 minutes a day, 7 days a week, you can get to an intermediate level in 48 weeks.
The bottom line. If you start out as a beginner and spend an average of 1 hour per day working on your Spanish, you should able to reach conversational fluency within 8 – 12 months. That translates to roughly 250 – 350 hours of time spent.
Across multiple sources, Mandarin Chinese is the number one language listed as the most challenging to learn. The Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center puts Mandarin in Category IV, which is the list of the most difficult languages to learn for English speakers.
According to the US Foreign Service Institute (FSI), if you spend an average of one hour per day studying Spanish, you could achieve fluency after 480 hours of work. That's just over a year. That's not bad at all, and it's a realistic time frame.
The most recent major study on language learning and age was conducted by researchers at Harvard and MIT. It concluded that starting to learn a new language before age 10 will give a learner the best chance of achieving proficiency similar to that of a native speaker.
Four years of a single foreign language. The study of history for at least two years, and preferably three years: American history, European history, and one additional advanced history course.
Honestly, it doesn't matter either way. Latin and Spanish are two different languages, as I emphasized up above. They do, however, have a lot of shared vocabulary roots and grammatical forms. This means that someone who is familiar with either language will have an advantage learning the other.
Going back to school is a major undertaking. As a mid-career professional, you might be wondering if it's too late to earn your degree. Don't worry, you're never too old to earn your degree. It's becoming increasingly common for individuals 40 and over to go back to school.
In conclusion, no age is too old to get a graduate degree. There are so many advantages in waiting a while for further study that you may even choose to become a lifelong learner!
It is never too late to go to college or benefit from the advantages of a postsecondary degree.
To optimize your learning, aim to spend between 15 and 30 minutes on the app each day. If you're struggling to commit a decent amount of time to your learning, try breaking the time up throughout your day. You could spend five minutes practicing in the morning, another five at lunchtime, and five more in the evening.
Meet Tommy Thompson (Learning Spanish for 3.5 years)
As Tommy says, “It's a special feeling to be able to communicate with someone in their own, native language, and I never thought I could do it.” But thanks to Duolingo, he has!
We see this question a lot and the answer is: yes. Duolingo is a free language-learning platform, and every language and lesson is totally free!