Duolingo Language Report Reveals Changes in Top 10 Languages Studied Around the World
End of year report highlights growing interest in Korean and Portuguese alongside personalized year-in-review experience
PITTSBURGH, Dec. 04, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Duolingo (NASDAQ: DUOL), the world’s #1 online learning platform, kicked off its end-of-year celebration of learning with the launch of its global , which examines the latest language learning trends based on data from millions of learners.
In 2023, more than 23 billion lessons were completed and nearly one and a half billion hours were spent learning on Duolingo. More than 32 million people worldwide studied more than one language this year. This year’s data shows how learner motivation and interest have impacted the top ten most popular languages. Key findings reveal:
- Korean continues to grow in global popularity. The Korean course jumped to #6 in global rankings. Around the world, young people are driving a growing interest in all Asian languages, especially Korean.
- Portuguese enters the top 10, bumping Russian from the list. Connecting with people (23%) and preparing for travel (18%) are the top reasons learners around the world choose to study Portuguese, and 72% of new Portuguese learners are under 30.
- English still tops the charts: English remains the most popular language to study around the world. It was the #1 language to study in 122 countries, which is three more than last year. 49% of global learners say they are motivated to study English for education or work purposes.
“Language is a bridge between cultures. We see cultural trends reflected in the data of our 83 million monthly learners around the world,” said Dr. Cindy Blanco, senior learning scientist and managing editor of learning content. “For example, we’ve seen interest in Korean entertainment, like K-Pop and K-dramas, increase recently and that’s reflected in Duolingo’s data. We can clearly see the growing demand for Korean language study, especially from younger learners.”
In addition to Duolingo’s Language Report, the brand unveiled its “Phrase of the Year” which is “The bird is a bot”. Duolingo selected this phrase to reflect the explosive growth and adoption of artificial intelligence technology as part of its annual social-first end-of-year marketing campaign.
Duolingo also released its Year in Review experience today, an engaging visualization of an individual’s year-long learning journey. Every learner is assigned one of eight different learner personas based on learning data, including hours spent learning, number of courses taken, what time a learner tends to practice, and more. All learners can relive their year on Duolingo and share personalized cards on social media to celebrate their accomplishments. The Year in Review experience is available now for all Duolingo learners who completed at least 10 lessons in 2023 and learners can find it by opening the Duolingo app on iOS and Android.
About Duolingo
Duolingo () is the most popular language-learning platform and the most downloaded education app worldwide. The app makes learning new languages fun with bite-sized lessons that feel like playing a game. The company's mission is to develop the best education in the world and make it universally available. Duolingo offers over 100 total courses across 42 distinct languages, from Spanish, French, German, and Japanese to Navajo and Yiddish.
About the data
The 2023 Duolingo Language Report includes information about learners who studied languages on Duolingo between October 1, 2022 and September 30, 2023. The data was aggregated by country or by language to ensure learner privacy. Country aggregations are based on internationally recognized, independent, self-governing entities as outlined . Age and motivation data are self-reported, and learners under 13 were excluded from all analyses. Also to the end of protecting learner privacy, rankings exclude countries where there are fewer than 5,000 Duolingo learners. Duolingo’s Year in Review for 2023 includes information about learners who completed at least 10 lessons between January 1, 2023 and November 30, 2023.
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