How Much is Duolingo Max? A Complete Guide to Duolingo Max Pricing, Plans, and Discounts
Its time for a Duolingo Max review. We have been using Duolingo Max for 8 months now and we thought it is about time to share our thoughts. Prior to upgrading to Duolingo Max we have all been long-term Duolingo users, of both the free and paid subscriptions. Duolingo really is a part of all our daily routines now, usually early in the mornings when the brain is fresh and we are trying to abide by the 5am Club principals :-). So, is the AI powered version worth the money, find out in this Duolingo Max review.
What is Duolingo Max?
Duolingo Max is a relatively new subscription tier on the Duolingo platform that was introduced in early 2024. It is powered by OpenAI and really showcases the possibilities on bringing AI into education tools for personalization of content, structured roleplays and detailed explanation of answers and/or mistakes.
As you will read in this Duolingo Max review, with this subscription tier, Duolingo have introduced new functionality that delivers a highly personalized and interactive learning experience. And the new features keep coming, since launch they have introduced in-app games, video calls with the hilarious Lilly and call in radio roleplays. We are sure that there is much more to come.
Duolingo Max gives you all the benefits of Duolingo Super as well as the new AI powered features which make learning a lot of fun and feel very personalized to your skill level and learning style.
What are our favorite features?
James: I love the “Explain My Answer” feature. I make a ton of mistakes, having suffered with Dyslexia from my youth, my spelling is notoriously bad, especially in a foreign language. (perfect for a blogger, right?). These simple spelling mistakes are easy to deal with and I learn by repetition of correcting the mistakes. But often I make mistakes where i am struggling to identify the correct answer, making educated guesses. Or where I am conjugating verbs incorrectly. And its in these scenarios where the “Explain My Answer” feature is so powerful. It allows you to understand exactly why your answer was incorrect, ask follow up questions and get further examples of how to avoid the same mistake in the future. For me, its like having a personal tutor available who is very patient and willing to explain my mistakes.
Shawn: I enjoy the video calls with Lilly. If you are new to Duolingo you may not know Lilly, but she is one of the central characters. Lily is full of humor and sarcasm that makes these sessions fun. Unlike some of the roleplays in Duolingo Super, that are quite structured and guided, these video sessions with Lilly are freeform. Lilly will start with a simple greeting and its up to you in which direction you take the conversation. In the past few sessions I have talked to her about an annoying cat in the neighborhood, my love of sail boats and my favorite restaurants in Paris. The AI behind this is powerful and it makes for a great conversation:
Tom: I’m a gamer. Always have been, always will be. The new game capabilities in Duolingo Max are basic but they really do make you think. And although the games are simple, they can be quite challenging. There was one, where Junior had lost his father at the airport, that took me a frustratingly long time to solve. I am sure that the games will get better and better over time, and for me, its a great way to learn.
Rhagu: The personalized practices are awesome. I come back to them time and time again when I want to make sure that I am retaining knowledge. These practices will focus on some of your weaker skills and help make sure that you really did learn in earlier exercises. They also seem to pull in random words and concepts from earlier sessions and test your retention of those. That is really helpful for me and makes me feel like I am practicing things I learned weeks ago without having to go back and redo lessons.
Duolingo Max Review: What is the pricing
Duolingo Max is expensive. The subscription costs $30 a month if you pay monthly, or $168 per year if you pay annually equating to $14 a month (which we do). They also offer a Family Plan allowing for 4 members for an annual subscription of $239.99. You can always find some promotion codes for a free trial of Duolingo Max meaning that you will get a few free months before the subscription starts.
Conclusion. Duolingo Max Review, is it worth the money?
It really does feel like you have a very personalized learning experience. We know that we are not actually working with a live human but it does feel that way. We sometimes test the personalization by doing the same session together, and none of our conversations are alike, they are entirely different and customized for the individual. The personalized practice and learning tips in are detailed, clear and helpful. We all love this version of Duolingo and can’t wait to see how the technology and learning experience continues to evolve.
But at the end of the day, our advice is to test at least one other language learning app before you make a long tern commitment to Duolingo. For example, try Babbel. Its a very different learning experience but something that suits a serious learner very well. Read our detailed guide on Babble vs Duolingo to find out more.
Happy learning!
