italki is an online platform that connects five million language learners with over 10,000 teachers. It’s designed to facilitate the process of finding the right tutors and language exchange partners.

italki allows you to speed up your language learning with a professional teacher via one-on-one lessons and practice your language skills in real conversation, at a price you can afford and with a schedule that works for you.

The great thing about it is that italki is not just a language learning platform, but also a social media website that allows you to interact with other language learners from all over the world. If you’d prefer to learn without a teacher, you can join the italki community where you share posts and receive feedback from other language learners.

Supported Languages

italki helps you learn and practice over 150 languages with professional online tutors. While the top 10 languages learned on the site are English, Spanish, French, Japanese, Chinese, German, Italian, Russian, Korean, and Portuguese, italki has also helped revive interest in endangered or vulnerable languages like Basque and Blackfoot.

Visit italki to find your ideal teacher and book a 1-on-1 lesson.

How italki Works

italki is a great resource that lets you connect with a native-speaking instructor or fellow language learners easily, no matter what time zone you are in or what part of the world you are based in. Here’s how to find language partners and professional teachers of your choice：

Community

italki offers a free Community where you can find language exchange partners and practice with them for free. Simply go to italki, check out the Community section, and follow each others’ accounts and you’ll be able to chat freely with them and help each other reach your language learning goals.

You can also share your preferred video call tool and hold great conversational sessions at no cost.

Book a Lesson

Sign up for italki, click Find a Teacher and check out the list of available teachers for you.

You can choose from two types of teachers: professional teachers who are certified in foreign language instruction and community tutors who are native or advanced teachers and can offer a more informal teaching experience. You’ll see their hourly rates (starting at just $4), video introduction, reviews, experience, and upcoming availability.

With so many options for instructors to choose from, you can easily find one that suits your style. Just filter the teacher options by country of origin, hourly rate, type of language instruction (e.g. business, test preparation), and other characteristics. 

How to Redeem italki Trial Lessons

italki offers trial lessons to help you quickly understand how the lesson works and if it’s good for your learning. Here’s how to use the trial lesson:

1. Sign up for italki and set your language to study.

2. On your Student Dashboard, you can view your remaining trial lessons. 

3. Click Find a Teacher. You can use the filter to customize your search such as where teachers are from, price, what language they speak, and more.

In general, trial lessons are 30-minutes long and they need to be taken with three different teachers. The trial lessons are offered by teachers at a discounted price, so as you can see, not all of them offer trial lessons.

4. When you find a teacher you like, check out their introduction video to see if they fit your style and see if their availability matches the time you have.

If you have already found a teacher you like without using all of your trial quotas, the good news is that trial lessons do not expire until you complete all of them. 

Conclusion

Overall, italki is a great resource for language learners who want to move from textbooks to practicing language skills in real conversation. It offers the most efficient system for finding a teacher that suits you and has the largest database of available teachers.