Like any language, Korean requires frequent exposure and lots of practice, so keeping up with your lessons on Duolingo is a great way to study. The Korean course has a special tab for learning Hangul where you can practice reading and forming Korean characters!
Duolingo's Korean course covers a good amount of basic words, which is a good starting point. But this course fails to go beyond beginner level, so users shouldn't expect to achieve high level fluency by only using this app.
So, if you are working really hard and have really good language aptitude, may be you can pass TOPIK level 1 or max 2 (which test listening and reading skills only) with Duolingo. Expecting to pass TOPIK level 3 or above with Duolingo or any similar app is unrealistic in my personal opinion.
You can learn as many words or sentences as you want, but until you're able to have a conversation with another person, you'll never be fluent. Or, according to the CEFR model, you won't even be halfway there. For that reason alone, learning a language with an app should be a starting point, not the end.
Having used both programs, I can say that Babbel is better than Duolingo in terms of effectiveness, engagement and offering guidance. I like that Duolingo is free, but that's about it. Babbel is hands down the better overall language learning app.
You don't need to spend hours on Duolingo each day. However, you must put a reasonable amount of time into learning. If you log in to complete one lesson and sign out as soon as you've reached 10XP, you won't get very far. To optimize your learning, aim to spend between 15 and 30 minutes on the app each day.
You could define Korean fluency as roughly being at an intermediate level. However, it all depends on your goals and what kind of Korean language skills are most important to you.
The FSI puts Korean as a Category V language. Which means, it's one of the hardest languages to master. They estimate 2200 hours of study before you can reach fluency in Korean. Or 88 weeks of extremely intense study.
It takes about three months or 90 days to learn enough Korean to have at least 3-minute conversations in Korean if you study for 7 to 10 hours per week. Moreover, after one year of looking at this pace, you will become fluent and comfortable with Korean conversation.
The effectiveness measure showed that on average participants gained 8.1 points per one hour of study with Duolingo. The 95% Confidence Interval for the effectiveness is from 5.6 points to 10.7 points gained per one hour of study.
A note from the Fluent in 3 Months team before we get started: You can chat away with a native speaker for at least 15 minutes with the "Fluent in 3 Months" method. All it takes is 90 days.
Unlike other East-Asian languages, Korean isn't a tonal language. This means, that the meaning of the word doesn't change, regardless of what your accent is like. This makes learning Korean much easier than Japanese.
The study showed that Koreans on average slept 6.3 hours per night, which was less than the Asia-Pacific average of 6.9 hours. However, Koreans actually want to sleep 7.5 hours every night.
Most people have embraced the 10,000-word vocabulary as the ideal word count for being fluent in Korean. With this level of language mastery, you will be able to read Korean web pages comfortably and effortlessly. Active memorization requires some effort and practice.
High schools in South Korea teach students for three years, from first grade (age 15–16) to third grade (age 17–18), and students commonly graduate at age 17 or 18.
Learn Korean in just 5 minutes a day. For free.
Learn Korean in just 5 minutes a day with our game-like lessons. Whether you're a beginner starting with the basics or looking to practice your reading, writing, and speaking, Duolingo is scientifically proven to work.
Korean language has a lot of connectors and sometimes the sentences can get really lengthy with so many connectors. Your poor brain will be busy figuring out the connectors in the first half of the sentence while your Korean friend would already have spoken 5 more sentences.
Once you complete all the levels in a unit, you'll complete a challenge to earn your unit trophy. You'll also have the option to earn the Legendary trophy for each unit.
Understanding the study
Duolingo learners and BrainHQ learners both demonstrated improved executive functioning and working memory, despite only one of the apps being an explicit “brain trainer”!
Research has shown that Duolingo is an effective way to learn a new language, but don't just take our word for it: Hear from a few learners who have been using Duolingo to achieve their learning goals!