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Learn Chinese by actually talking.

Not multiple choice. You type whatever you want in Chinese, to people with moods, opinions and days of their own, and they answer in Chinese. A teacher marks your mistakes in red pen while you carry on.

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Who you talk to in Chinese

Each one has a life, a way of speaking, and something they'd rather talk about.

苏晴 (Su Qing)
At the café
Every table at the café is taken except one, across from a woman reading Eileen Chang. She glances up at you, then back at her book.

You speak first. Try 你好 (nǐ hǎo) — hello.
格里马 (Grimar)
At the inn
Woodsmoke and firelight, barrels stacked behind the bar, mugs hanging from the beams. The dwarf drying a tankard looks you over as you take a stool.

晚上好！请坐。想喝点什么？Good evening! Have a seat. What would you like to drink?
张奶奶 (Zhang Nainai)
At her kitchen table
A whitewashed brick cottage, a courtyard with a persimmon tree, and a kitchen that smells of garlic and fresh dough. Your host sets a steaming bowl of jiaozi in front of you and sits down across the table to watch you eat.

吃吧，孩子，快吃！饺子还热着呢。Eat, child, eat up! The jiaozi are still hot.
杜神父 (Father Du)
Outside the church
The bells have just stopped ringing. People drift out of the big wooden doors into the sunny courtyard, and a priest in a black cassock comes down the steps, notices an unfamiliar face, and walks over to you.

早上好！以前没见过你。你是第一次来吗？Good morning! I haven't seen you before. Is this your first time here?
老陈 (Lao Chen)
At the market
Crates of tomatoes and apples, bunches of herbs, and a brass scale at the end of the table. The big man behind the stall has his hands clasped in front of him. He looks at you and waits.

说吧，要什么？Go ahead. What do you want?

A course from HSK 1 to HSK 9

Standard Mandarin, written in simplified characters. Every word you look up shows its pinyin, tones marked.

China's national standard (GF 0025-2021) and the new HSK: nine levels in three stages. Lessons go level by level, one idea at a time, with examples built from your own mistakes, and you can ask for a lesson on anything you like.

Li Ting, your tutor, runs the drills and the review. Wang Laoshi, your teacher, gives the lessons.

Letters first

Chinese has writing of its own. Letters teaches pinyin (拼音), the sounds of Mandarin in Latin letters, tones included, a few at a time, with a bar under each one showing how well you know it.

It speaks and it listens

Every line can be read aloud, in a man's or a woman's voice that sounds the same on a phone, a Mac or a Windows machine. Say a word back and you're told whether you said it right.

In your own language

You can learn Chinese from any of fourteen languages: the app speaks to you in yours, and every meaning and every correction is written in it.

What happens while you talk

She answers like a person

Warm, bored, teasing, prickly — her mood carries from line to line instead of resetting to pleasant. Say something thoughtless and she notices.

A teacher marks your mistakes

In red pen, in a school notebook, while you carry on. Endings, verb forms, word order, the word that was nearly right. Never mid-sentence.

Words collect themselves

Tap anything you didn't know. It becomes a flashcard with its forms, a note and an example sentence, without you typing a thing.

Then you drill them

Reading, listening, typing, saying it out loud, filling a gap in a sentence, and building one yourself. Six ways, because recognizing a word is not the same as being able to use it.

And review, at the right moment

Real spaced repetition, the same scheduling serious learners use — so a word comes back just before you'd have forgotten it.

With lessons when you want them

Your teacher takes one idea at a time, building examples from your own mistakes. You decide what the lesson is about.

One price

$12/month

Unlimited conversations and lessons
Drills, spaced review and word groups
Words read aloud, and your own speaking checked
Export everything, any time

Join the waitlist

Plus tax where applicable. The first seven days are free; starting them takes a card. Cancel before they end and you pay nothing.

Before you ask

Do I need a special keyboard?: For a language with its own alphabet, yes, and it's worth ten minutes to add one. Your operating system already has it. Nothing here transliterates for you, because typing it is part of learning it.
I'm a complete beginner.: That's who it's for. The first conversation gives you the line to say and what it means. You can ask for a hint at any point, or just listen and let her carry on.
What happens if I cancel?: Conversations and lessons stop. Your words, groups, notes and transcripts stay, and you can read and export them for as long as you like.

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