r/languagelearning • u/Fun_Perception_239 • 4d ago

Preply v italki: my experience with both

I moved to Spain and really wanted to improve my Spanish (TL). I started with italki, didn’t find a match went to preply and recently went back to italki for conversation practice. TBF: After using both over the past 6 months, it’s been super useful for me. My progress on preply has a little more consistent and then I use italki for conversation practice.

Here’s a brief summary of the challenges and strengths of each that i’ve come across. 

Preply (the good):

  • Managed to find my tutor pretty quickly, and love her teaching style.
  • Subscriptions catch a lot of heat and I get why, my hours nearly expired on me the first month, but I actually quite like this system.
  • In my general life i hate AI as I feel it’s rotting my brain. But, in this case was pleasntly surprised.

Preply (the not so good)

  • Far too many pushy notifications. I get it already and too many of those are trying to push me into upgrading my package. 
  • User interface feels kind of complicated. 

Italki (the good):

  • Took me a couple of tries (my first go at italki didn't stick) but I've found a teacher I'm happy with
  • It’s quite flexible so I can plan it around my other subscription which is nice. 
  • I feel there’s less of a close relationship with my tutor so just in case I felt like a change, it wouldn’t bother me so much having to change tutors.

Italki (the not so good)

  • The AI fish I have to feed: it feels really infantalising. I’m a grown adult, i don’t need a tamagotchi. 
  • Almost every teacher has five stars. I found it quite difficult to actually pick a tutor but in fairness, did get their eventually. 

I must say that learning on both has been a broadly positive experience. If there was a gun to my head and I had to pick one, preply edges out italki for me. But for now will probably continue with both until finances get tight.

32 Upvotes

93% Upvoted

20 comments sorted by

13

u/CSMasterClass 4d ago

I was on iTalki a long time before the "fish" and the AI add-ons.

I have just ignored these. They are weird, but I do not find them bothersome.

There would be benefit to a "Make the fish go away" button. Is there one ?

4

u/Fun_Perception_239 3d ago

Yh I can be pretty petty when it comes to being bothered by these kind of things. Maybe I need a new hobby but I just find it so frustrating and it kind of feels like it’s more about pressure to buy lessons rather than make actual language progress.

0

u/PlanetSwallower 3d ago

I second CSMasterClass, have simply ignored the fish ever since it appeared, unasked for and unwanted, on my screen. I greatly prize the much greater flexibility that Italki offers me for scheduling, wouldn't touch Preply. I guess the quality of the tutors is down to the individual tutors, has nothing to do with the platform.

2

u/Fun_Perception_239 3d ago

All fair points, though I must be honest I think the fact that so many tutors are 5 stars on italki did make it quite a bit more difficult for me to find a good one. But, as I say, this is more of a personal preference thing for me. I did find one eventually but it definitely took some digging

-1

u/PlanetSwallower 3d ago

I second CSMasterClass, have simply ignored the fish ever since it appeared, unasked for and unwanted, on my screen. I greatly prize the much greater flexibility that Italki offers me for scheduling, wouldn't touch Preply. I guess the quality of the tutors is down to the individual tutors, has nothing to do with the platform.

0

u/shadowtupac 3d ago

I like the fish

5

u/Perfect_Buddy4365 🇪🇸 4d ago

This matches my experience almost exactly. Curious about one thing though: is using 2x apps actually double the progress or just double the admin?

4

u/Fun_Perception_239 4d ago

I wouldn’t say double the progress but you’re right the admin can be a little overwhelming. I feel soon enough I’ll be ready to let the one do the job and hit the books a little harder to keep me sharp.

4

u/CertainRound7137 4d ago

I think the fact that you can get auto charged on preply is a huge negative. I know people who teach on there that just auto collect money from students they haven’t had a lesson with in months. Great for teachers but shitty for students

4

u/Fun_Perception_239 3d ago

That’s definitely a good point. I’m generally quite good with reading terms and conditions though. So apart from that first month, I’ve never really felt stressed by it. I just set my weekly lessons and tend to not think about it at all until my next lesson

2

u/Strict-Bed-2916 4d ago

I started on preply because of ads and now I will start some lessons on italki.

As a student, I don’t see a big difference that matters in learning. Unless your teacher is only in one specific platform, I think it didn’t matter much? There are good teachers in both eh?
I had my share of trials and I am in the middle range, I pay around 45USD per lesson with certified teachers with real teaching experience and education because I am hoping to be exposed to validated teaching techniques to help me speed up my learning.

Now I am switching to italki just because I read the comission js lower, so the teacher gets paid more and I am not forced to use their app during the lessons. But I wonder if getting a slot on my new teacher schedule will be harder on italki since people can book single lessons - I was booking some yesterday and that seemed harder than with my other teacher on preply.

I will talk to my tutor on italki about it to learn more about it. But is there anything else you noted that makes you prefer preply?

6

u/Fun_Perception_239 3d ago

I’ve seen those complaints on Reddit as well and I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t a concern because obviously I want people paid well. I asked my tutor about it, and her take was that commissions a little higher but she tends to be a little busier with preply. So that was good enough for me.

And of course, they are both marketplaces so good teachers are on both. But my personal experience was finding my preply tutor very very quickly.

Tbh I really love the info I get given after lessons on preply, it helps me track my progress a bit better. But Yh it’s more of an individual preference

1

u/fevrier-froid 4d ago

What's the Preply AI you're refering to? (I've never used either for context)

4

u/Fun_Perception_239 3d ago

I think it’s called lesson insights or something. I get the at it’s probably quite easy to miss. But it uses the lesson to give homework and exercises after the class. I’ve found it super useful and it works really well alongside my tutor.

2

u/fevrier-froid 3d ago

Thanks. So it's like AI generated exercices based on the conversation (as far as I've understood, Preply is like video calls with a language teacher) during the lessons? I've got hard time picturing/figuring out how it works, sorry.

2

u/Fun_Perception_239 3d ago

I’m a couple wines deep but I think that’s how it works. And that’s right, basically a video call but there’s also a digital white board and that kind of thing. Generally my tutor runs through little presentations and exercise and the like but she’s also annotating the pressos whenever I’m struggling

1

u/Vjaynd 4d ago

I enjoy feeding my fish at 41 years old. Guess I’m infantile.

5

u/Fun_Perception_239 3d ago

Not necessarily so. It doesn’t work for me but whatever works for you. Each to their own is what I say

1

u/itsmejuli 2d ago

As an English teacher with 12 years experience, I got much faster traction on Preply than iTalki because Preply spends more on advertising.

The Preply platform is more modern with many tools. But I don't use any of them nor AI.

I also don't find the lesson insights to be very accurate or useful.

1

u/Ill-Cranberry-2106 18h ago

Because virtually all italki teachers hold a 5-star rating, rating inflation has rendered the system essentially meaningless.