Honest Critique of Language Learning Methods

In this episode of Phrasing FM, the host explains why he built Phrasing after being frustrated with every other language learning approach. He breaks down four major alternatives, their shortcomings, and how Phrasing addresses them all — delivering an engaging, efficient, multi-language system that works for beginners and advanced learners alike.

00:10 – Introduction Why build another language app? The host reviews common methods and why none fully satisfied him for long-term, multi-language learning.

00:44 – 1. Comprehensible Input (Dreaming Spanish, ALG)

• Pure listening/watching “interesting” content at your level.

• Main issues: Extremely boring for beginners, slow (thousands of hours), hard to stay consistent, repetitive simple content loses appeal.

• Still values input, but not as the primary method.

02:29 – 2. Traditional Methods (Textbooks, Classes, Assimil)

• Structured grammar-first approach.

• Drawbacks: Feels slow and disconnected, teaches “proto-language” instead of natural speech, retrospective grammar is better than prospective, ends with “now go practice” after completion.

• Creates a detour from real native usage.

06:32 – 3. Spaced Repetition Apps (Anki, Lingvist, Memrise)

• Powerful for retention but flawed for initial learning.

• Anki is effective but a “daily grind” with poor UX.

• Great once you know material, weak at teaching unknowns or providing context/explanations.

• Progressive decks sound good in theory but break down in practice.

11:55 – 4. Gamified Apps (Duolingo, Babbel)

• Guided courses optimized for new users and mass appeal.

• Tyranny of the marginal user: Features diluted to attract beginners, less effective for serious or intermediate learners.

• Not suitable for fluency or maintaining existing languages.

15:21 – Additional Challenges

• Managing multiple languages (new + maintenance) simultaneously.

• Improving existing languages (French, Dutch, etc.) where content feels stale.

• Need for one unified habit instead of overwhelming context-switching.

19:57 – How Phrasing Solves Everything

• Native-level expressions from day one with Language Graph and 3D reviews.

• Excellent UX that’s addictive and low-stress.

• Priority-based multi-language support.

• Pre-generated explanations + LLM for curiosity-driven deep dives.

• Combines benefits of input, SRS, and more without the downsides.

• Never “finishes” — infinite, engaging progress.

26:04 – Conclusion Phrasing is the host’s favorite (and most effective) way to learn. Ideal for anyone who’s struggled with other methods or wants to learn multiple languages sustainably.

SEO keywords: why I built Phrasing, best language learning app, Anki vs Phrasing, Duolingo alternatives, comprehensible input critique, spaced repetition for multiple languages, improve existing languages, 3D flashcards.

AI Transcript

00:00 All right. And welcome back to another episode of Phrasing FM, a podcast where I talk about languages and my experience building an app to learn them.

00:10 Today, I want to talk about some of the alternatives to Phrasing and more specifically, why I didn't find any of them sufficient to learn languages, or why I felt the need to build my own language learning application.

00:24 There are many different ways to learn a language. There are many different apps out there, so why did I need to build something different? What is different about Phrasing? So we're going to go through four ways to learn a language without Phrasing, and why I don't like to learn languages in each of those ways.

00:44 The first one is the comprehensible input approach. This one has many names: language acquisition, comprehensible input, ALG or automatic language growth, Dreaming Spanish. And this is just the idea that you watch content over and over that's at or above your level, and you naturally pick up the language. It's just effortless.

01:18 And then you leave after a couple thousand hours, you have perfect ability to perform in the language. They make some pretty ridiculous claims. One of the things that I feel like is the biggest lie of this approach is just learn from interesting content. You cannot find interesting content when you don't speak a language.

02:02 I persevere, and I watch content every single day for maybe max two weeks before I just cannot pay attention to what's being said anymore. I am so beyond bored and it is such a slow and long process. This takes thousands of hours of watching really boring, repetitive content.

02:36 And it is so not engaging. And it is so slow that even if it did teach a language as well as it claims, I still would never be able to do it because for me, it's just not engaging. That's not a viable solution.

03:09 Now, that's not to say that comprehensible input is not effective. I still think input is required. However, I don't think it should be the primary driver of learning, especially in the beginning.

03:29 The second way to learn a language would be through more traditional methods. These would be classrooms or textbooks, or even maybe Assimil. Any kind of guided structured approach through the language. And this is definitely a viable way to learn a language. However, there are a couple reasons that I don't like it.

03:59 One is that it definitely feels slower. These structured grammar exercises, they're so clean and sanitary and disconnected from the richness of language. I also don't like the idea of learning through these different rules, and trying to build up a language from the bottom, from a set of grammar rules. Grammar is retrospective, not prospective.

04:49 And I always feel like it's a detour. Like you spend so much time to get to this point, which yes, you're technically speaking a language, but at the same time, no, you don't speak the language and you know you don't speak the language. And then once you get there, you have to then correct course to get back onto a native track.

05:51 So I personally, I don't enjoy this method of learning. And I wanted to find something that was more targeted, more direct, and just more efficient and more engaging.

06:32 And so if we're talking something more efficient, then clearly that must be Anki or flashcards. This would also include Memrise and Lingvist and all of the other spaced repetition applications. I am a long time Anki user. I have used Anki many, many times to great success. I am a big fan of spaced repetition.

07:08 However, I used Lingvist to even better success. The biggest difference between them is that Lingvist is just enjoyable to use. It looks nice. It has audio integrated with it. It's much less effort. I don't dread using Lingvist nearly as much as I dreaded using Anki.

07:58 A lot of people will call Anki their daily grind, and I don't think that language learning should feel like your daily grind. It should be something that you look forward to doing. And these just do not describe any of the other spaced repetition apps on the market.

08:39 There's also a problem with these applications where Anki is where you put stuff that you've already learned that you want to remember. But they don't really answer the question of what if you don't know the content? What if you don't know anything about the language at all?

09:57 And so it's a nice idea with the building up these decks, but within a month, it's all over the place. Yes, you've seen the words before, but you don't necessarily know them. And it just doesn't deliver on what I want out of an application.

11:55 And then the fourth way to learn a language would be with apps like Duolingo or more traditional language learning apps. Maybe Babbel would be in here. And these all suffer from the same problems as the traditional approaches, but they suffer from a bigger problem: a lot of them are optimized for mass appeal. The tyranny of the marginal user.

13:36 And with apps like these more traditional style applications, a lot of them are really focused on day zero. They're publicly traded companies that need to grow by getting new users. And so the experience just becomes worse and worse for the people who do want to learn a language.

14:30 I don't think you can learn a language to fluency with Duolingo. They're great applications, but they're just targeting something different. They're targeting the user who has not learned languages before and needs things to be really guided. And that's not me.

15:21 And so those are the four ways to learn a language and why I do not like using them. There's also another reason that none of them really worked for me, and that's that I wanted to learn multiple languages. I really want to learn Croatian. However, I really need to improve my Dutch. And also I'd like to improve my French... And these are languages that I will not regret having exposure to.

16:52 And the thing is, I didn't want to have to choose between these. I wanted to do them all. Why not just make progress on all of these at the same time? None of these approaches really work for managing all of your goals.

17:44 There's also an issue with all of the previous methods where none of them really work for existing languages. For example, I speak French and Dutch... but none of these options are good options for me to improve these languages.

19:57 And so these are all the reasons that I set off to make Phrasing. When it comes to improving my French, I learn new words in French every day... The language contouring technique works exceptionally well. Even if you already speak a language, you feel like you're making progress from day one.

20:27 Phrasing doesn't pull any punches. There's no tyranny of the marginal user. I just want to make an app that teaches the most language possible, and an app that can take you all the way to fluency and beyond. There's no finishing Phrasing ever.

21:01 The experience is simple, addicting. The UI is incredible. Explanations everywhere. So you never get lost and confused. The algorithm tries to work with human psychology. I sometimes call it dopamine driven reviews.

21:46 You start learning expressions, native level expressions from day one so you avoid the proto language for sure. There's no dry, clean, sanitary learning of sentences. You just jump into native level sentences and at native level speed of audio.

23:10 And then lastly, versus comprehensible input, Phrasing does have this idea of comprehensible input a little bit baked into it... With the expressions, that's definitely the case.

25:20 And so with all of these, you put all of these together and you get Phrasing, and it finally solves all of the problems that I have with learning languages. I feel like this is a process and a habit that I can keep up for the rest of my life. It's something that I enjoy doing. It's something that I get addicted to and it's just been really, really effective so far.

25:48 So if any of this has resonated with you... get Phrasing a shot. I really think that it is definitely my favorite way to learn a language. Phrasing.app. If you have any questions, leave them in the comment down below and I'll catch you next time. Thanks.

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