Has anyone learned a language from scratch with Lingq only?
NoraJuneAngela

To my mind it’s much more efficient and effective to start a language journey combining experience (for example, using very simple material in Lingq) with study using a high-quality “communicative-approach“ beginners text book!!!
I believe it is possible to learn from scratch purely via input and automatic absorbtion — but I think it would take you multiple times as long. I think it would be hugely less efficient and effective…
chimptastic

If the language uses an alphabet or writing system that you already know, and the grammar isn't too insane, it should be totally possible. But something like Arabic will likely require you to utilize outside resources if only to get the alphabet and some of the more opaque grammatical complexities down.
skyblueteapot

Yes, me, Japanese and just now starting with Spanish.
I start with the beginner 1 level classes, the ones that are only a few sentences long, lingQ all the words. I don't bother with flashcards, I keep reading and listening and move words to known when I recognise them in context while reading.
That way I even learn kanji. You need to be prepared to not understand most of what you read / hear at first. If a lesson looks like "qwer tyu iop SHARK asdf ghjk", well then, you've learned 1 word, congratulations! Re read tomorrow or move on to the next one!
nealcaffrey2

Hello !
For me, I began Spanish with lingq and stick with it for a few months until I had a good level to understand almost everything but I'm french and it's a very similar language.
Currently I'm studying Russian from scratch in LingQ and I must say it's working but it's very long.. I've just finished the first Harry Potter in Russian, I know a bunch of words but there's si much more to learn just to be able to communicate with a native. So at some point I'll need to use other tools than
ericfromlingq

Yes, Japanese. I went from 0 to decent (still learning). I just import whatever I find interesting (and comprehensible) into my account. Read, listen, write (sometimes), talk to tutors (often) and review. I have used a couple other grammar books as well. However, the main tool has always been LingQ.
daniel870

I've used LingQ to study Spanish from scratch, and it's doable to reach advanced levels using LingQ as your only tool. I also found LingQ to be very good, specifically for Korean, because of the way it allows you to read and translate Hangul.
bankeinanin

Yes,
But only because with LingQ it provides immersion material and you can upload your own.
If you spend most of the time with the reader, you would just obsess over words and conscious knowledge.
It's true effectiveness lies in that it's allows the learner to practice intensive study of the language IN THE SERVICE OF IMMERSION.
The principle is that if you practice a small amount of consistent time involved in intensive study, immersion is immensely more effective. If you only intensively study, you're trying to beat knowledge in your head.
ZayaFTW

Would you elaborate on what you mean, please?
I am currently only using LingQ as an aid to my German reading comprehension and so only read on here.
Am I wasting time by obsessing over words and conscious knowledge?
How may I improve?
Hagowingchun

He is saying that if you only read you will only have concious knowledge of the meaning of the words which I would say is mostly true (you still learn the words in the patterns they are used in the language), but to solve this just listen to stuff where if you were to read it you already know 90%+ of the words. Then after some time your brain can unconciously process the words for meaning. Don't be scared of building concious knowledge of the language because it is still very useful, but don't expect to flip on the tv, and understand everything like your native language until you have listened for many hours and have lots of concious knowledge too. Goodluck with your german adventures!
bankeinanin

What said.
I'm saying that studying through the reader and parts of LingQ unlock immersion to really work. But it's the immersion (and later practicing speaking and refining the language) that really makes it all work.
bankeinanin

I've been getting into Refold, which is from Matt vs Japan and some colleagues, where they basically put together many of the immersion learning ideas out there.
Matt talks about the danger of becoming "reading dominant" as worse than early output/speaking.
If you're concerned with words and reading too much and neglect listening and watching it really gets in the way of accent and intuitive understanding of the language.
But studying using LinQ or Anki primes the subconscious recognition response while immersing.
In my first year of Spanish I had to cut reading way down to learn to listen and watch ~80% of my time. LingQ makes it all more comprehensible as pure immersion takes forever and doesn't work for many of us of whom are not prodigies in language learning.
EthanRob

Not yet. But I am learning other languages.
nfera

I have not, but I would like to point out that even the founder of this software (Steve) does not learn "a language from scratch with Lingq only." It is only the foundation of his language learning. My guess is you can become fluent in reading and listening, but you cannot become fluent in writing and speaking for the obvious reason that you don't practise these skills on LingQ.
As an example, I've had only 200 hours of listening and 600k words read and the other day I met someone who spoke Italian (non-native). For the life of me, I just couldn't say anything. I just couldn't produce any of the words that I 'supposably' know. I can recognise lots of words when I read them and (a little less) words when I hear them, but I just couldn't say anything. Just mind blank... I imagine it will come quite fast, but with zero speaking/writing practise, you cannot speak/write. But perhaps this is obvious.
I would also like to point out that by learning a language, you also need to learn about the culture. A lot of communication is done through body language, which you just don't get by reading and listening. You have to watch videos (which would help), but you have to interact with native speakers. For instance, someone can be 'fluent' in the English language (that is, have perfect grammar and use of idioms, etc.), but I could still have large amounts of miscommunication with them simply because they don't understand hand gestures in English (Anglo countries), cultural taboos, subtle undertones (which is rampant in English, especially in British culture), etc.
TL;DR I haven't and I would be sceptical if someone says they have.
rokkvi

I think you can certainly start a language from scratch on LingQ and become fluently literate and fluent or near fluent in understanding of spoken language through it. You do have to converse and write (which you can sort of do on LingQ it's just limited or costly) to reach complete, overall fluency though.
MarkE

I would say in terms of listening comprehension and reading comprehension I have reached fluency in German. I have only ever used LingQ. Just tons of reading and tons of listening,
hbar

I'm about to follow you down that well-trodden path my friend.
FernandoLernen

Hello MarkE. Can you suggest me material here on LingQ in order to reach fluency in German? Im A1-A2 level, and used LingQ for just a few days. So far I'm finding the first 60 stories very boring. Thanks
ericb100

Not MarkE, but I'll answer...Unfortunately most beginning level material is pretty boring, so you might have to bear with some of it for a couple thousand words...
However, there are some pretty good choices for A2 level...
DIno Lernt Deutsch series - I was able to import into LingQ by just copying and pasting the chapters as lessons. The stories are interesting. Maybe a little slow at first. I like how each book features a different German speaking city.
Nachrichten Leicht - https://www.nachrichtenleicht.de/ -- you can import the articles into LingQ and also download/upload to LingQ the audio for each article. This was my bread and butter along with Dino Lernt Deutsch for that A2-B1 range.
Nico's Weg - https://learngerman.dw.com/en/nicos-weg/c-36519789 -- There is A1, A2, B1, and I think B2. (I've only copied the link to A1). I believe you can find all the lessons imported into LingQ already. The story is simple but interesting enough with the video. You can do the exercises on the website, if you wish, or just read/listen in LingQ or view on the website.
hbar

I learned French to fluency using no textbooks. Reading and listening only.
alandickey

PS - i would say that if you dip into another related language's resources on lingq whilst you are focusing on the main one, you will find many cognates that somehow seem to massively accelerate your progress in the Main one. They provide hooks that help new words to stick. I do Danish at the moment mainly until I get up to a decent awareness (for me I picked 4444). Then I dip into Norwegian or Swedish or Icelandic resources at some point during the day so I can avoid any chance of boredom. Boredom kills all chances of any progress at least for me. I was never interested in books they gave us at school for French A level, so learnt next to nothing. Now, I can read Houellebecq and Foenkinos novels with no problem by importing them and enjoying MY choice of material. Try importing books or articles you know from your own language, translated into whatever one you are learning, or vice versa. You will find this massively accelerates things when you know the gist.
alandickey

I have - I just adore this app. For years i struggled to make any progress at all because i got utterly bored looking up every word i didnt know in a German novel or Swedish newspaper. I was exhausted and demotivated by all the leafing, With Lingq i have learned 1549 words of Danish in less than a fortnight. This i put down to the usually very large range of topics covered within the litte courses that you can find for most languages. I 100% agree with Steve that learning by NOT focusing on the language is how language is acquired. In other words, finding a text that holds your interest somehow allows your brain to acquire many words and constructions almost subliminally. I find then the yellow highlighting very good - when I spot one again, it definitely makes me attend to the word and if I read for one hour to two hours per day, I find I start to accelerate. As I have spent 40 years learning languages, I am currently just reading until each shows as 4444 known. iThese are just arbitrary figures but they keep my statistics column tidier under the flag at the top right. I find it incredibly de-stressing to use Lingq to keep tabs on where I am with them all, as they always felt unmanageable before, as it never felt like I was making any progress at all, and as I got bored with a whole novel. I have 10 minute attention span but everything sticks, just as it did as a child, if I am interested in the short text. Once I have levelled everything up to 4444, I will read in each again until all are at 5555 known, And so on until they are all at say 20,000 which is more than enough for most purposes. Some of my languages I know would already be at 15,000 or so, but Lingq clarifies it all for me and makes me feel in control, rather than beleaguered. Danish is a new language to me so it will be interesting to see how long it takes to get to 4444, before I then move on to Dutch which is also a new language for which I have also only ever used Lingq. I totally recommend this app for those who feel like they are obsessed by languages but cannot manage them and need some kind of system to cater for any number over 5, which for me became hugely draining and even demotiating in fact. I started to feel like my languages were a millstone and it is only because of LIngq experiences that i have now felt like embarking on Danish. I got my mojo back.
chytran

I used lingq from scratch and got to a decent level to converse with people and watch youtube videos whenever I want. Sometimes I might not understand but most of the time get the general idea.
Safran

May I ask if you are referring to Chinese? I have tried several coursebooks but gave up! Can you elaborate a bit on your process?
chytran

I only used lingq to learn chinese. The goal is to get used to the characters->acquired words -> convert to listening->speaking naturally comes. That's what I experience. Biggest stepping stone is word count.
Safran

How did you read and listen? I saw you have many known words in Chinese, over 40 000 if Im not mistaken, so I'd be interested in your exact steps/method. Did you read/listen first? Or did you listen and read at the same time? How many times did you cover the text etc? Your path seems to have worked, so I'd appreciate it, if you shared
chytran

I read until I reached 5000 lingq known words, which could be equivalent to 250-500 characters but all combined differently. There was a study somewhere that I don't remember is that it takes about 9-35 encounters to get used to a word, in other words, you need to encounter the same word in that many different context and not from the sentences that you have already read unless you give it time and almost forgot about it and then you can. After 5000, I told myself that I would learn 100 words a day on lingq, which in reality is 5 new characters but 95 scrambled word combinations to create different meaning. I don't read the white known words and hunt only the yellow/blue words. Basically spaced repetition system in a sentence setting, which is more soothing and natural since we're used to reading in a left to right format. After you reached a certain amount of characters or "known words", you should listen to content you can tolerate since the beginning listening is really boring and dull. My condition is that I could only acquire the words from listening only if I knew every single word in that specific sentence while listening, so knowing the words are highly critical I think. My goal is to acquire the meaning of the words through listening since acquiring words through reading and acquiring "listening" words through listening is different I think. Especially in chinese. If I were to reset from 0 again, I would solely focus on reading 100% and acquire until reaching 20,000 words which every word is a multiplying affect to your studies and then go full out listening. There is a user that approaches chinese through solely reading heavily in the beginning and then started listening after fully acquiring possibly everything goes by a user of @TofuMeow , I recommend you ask this user questions for reading and word acquisition. Another user you can ask is @bamboozled. This user is highly balanced in everything. Word acquisition, reading, and listening. Very balanced. I just specialize in listening in the condition that my word count controls my progress. If you want more specific answers, ask me any specific questions you may have. If you want my opinionized number of what you should aim for daily in the beginning is:
known words: 30
lingq: 100>
reading: doesn’t matter too much
listening: 2hours to get used To sounds
if you want faster progress, increase the lingqs a lot and the known words will follow.
”Did you read/listen first?”
I “read” first even though I may not know the sound. My goal was to get the image of each non known in my head, get used to the pinyin structure and move on. I only listen to things that I have already lingqed and white known words. I LingQed all words and then listen the next day to the lesson I have ”read” the day before. While listening and reading, I hear a sentence, LingQ that entire sentence and then repeat.
“did you listen and read at the same time?”
Only when I’m actively listening. There’s the debate between active and passive listen so you should look into that debate. I passive listen to only things that I have actively listened to. Listen few times->active listen->any free time listen to it after you have actively listened.
“How many times did you cover the text etc?”
read once and “read and listen together once. A total of two per lesson. Never went back to any past lessons ever unless you want to
Safran

Thanks for the detailed description. I might give it another go in the future!
For some reason the reply button is missing from your detailed report, so I'm answering to your old post
George_Pig

I find LingQ great once you're past the beginner stage. I believe with a language with *very* close grammar or vocab (I personally think vocab is king) it is possible. I've just on a whim gone through a few mini-stories in French and it is very do-able as an English speaker with weak Spanish.
ColinJohnstonov

I know English and German and it is working really well for me with Russian as a beginner. It also seemed to work well with Mandarin but I lost motivation after a short time so I didn't get very far. It's a hard slog though at the start, though I don't know any method that isn't.
hellion

I agree, vocab similarity is more important. I feel like eventually grammar just reveals itself, but vocab is a different beast altogether. I truly admire Europeans who tackle Arabic, Mandarin etc., and vise versa. It adds a HUGE amount of extra difficultly.
Moawadalla

I can talk from my experience that starting a language from scratch and only rely totally on Lingq will not push you further at all. I started to learn German one year ago when I moved to Germany and went through the conventional path (text books + german classes). I built a solid foundation for the language in the all areas till B1 level, after that I started to use this portal which boost the language tremendously. Long story short if you wanna start with a language pretty similar to your language with having a basic background before this portal is a great tool otherwise you going to waste your time. Liebe Grüße
ColinJohnstonov

"I can talk from my experience that starting a language from scratch and only rely totally on Lingq will not push you further at all."
Out of interest, which experience are you referring to since your post suggests you didn't try to learn German this way anyway?
rokkvi

I always end up using other ways in addition to LingQ, especially just conversing, whether through programs like Tandem or just in real life. I have started languages from scratch here on LingQ though, although you can argue whether it's really from scratch when you already know other, similar languages, but I did start Dutch, Spanish and Italian from scratch here. I did eventually read a novel in Dutch outside of LingQ and half a children's book in Spanish, but so far I have only really used LingQ for Italian.
ColinJohnstonov

I mostly am doing it for Russian at the moment and it is going well, but it needs quite a bit more time in the oven before I start getting the caviar out. I used mostly the stuff in the library for the first months but quickly moved to importing stuff. I have three sources of content: the news (mostly 'fakes' like Meduza), books, and (of course) Russian with Max.
The only other resource that I used at the start was a basic list mapping Cyrillic characters to sounds, and with that written out on a piece of paper I just started with some basic intro lessons on LingQ. It was slow for weeks since each word was a struggle to get through, but it quickly became quite easy to guess the approximate sound of a word and the TTS on LingQ really helped. After that I just did the normal thing of reading stuff and then listening to it and that basically all I have done since.
I do get some explanations from my Russian wife and I do have a few grammar books and the Assymil Russian book, but I have barely touched them. Maybe it doesn't count then as "with LingQ only". I guess nobody has truly just used LingQ only.
JCampa0612

I use lingQ so I can read better and help me gain more vocabulary also is super useful since I am studying Japanese and It has Kanji characters, but you can't just depend in LingQ may I ask what language you are trying to learn?
ColinJohnstonov

According to her profile, Safran is learning every language in the world and when she runs out she will invent some new ones to learn.
Safran

I was just curious. I was thinking of taking up Norwegian, because I found sth interesting on Netflix, but there are a couple of languages on lingq where I don't own a textbook, and that look interesting like Tagalog and Indonesian.
George_Pig

With Tagalog, we have a lot of really great dictionaries. I've been trying to find some good EN-ID dictionaries to suggest to LingQ for Indonesian. Indonesian is simpler than Tagalog (cat 2 ID cat 3 TL). Steve himself made a video on studying Indonesian from scratch with LingQ if you'd like to use his hypothetical methodology.
Safran

Thanks I will have a