Interested in learning a new language this year? Duolingo’s latest AI lessons will primarily help newcomers, but more advanced capabilities will be introduced in the upcoming months.
Recently, Duolingo revealed a transition to an “AI-First” approach, starting immediately with the release of 148 new courses developed through generative AI.
According to Duolingo, this represents the most significant expansion in the company’s history, effectively doubling its existing course offerings. The update makes the seven most popular non-English languages—Spanish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, and Mandarin—accessible to all 28 supported user interface (UI) languages, offering potential benefits to a billion learners.
The new courses primarily cater to beginners and feature immersive options such as Stories for reading comprehension and DuoRadio for listening practice. More advanced options are anticipated in the coming months, as per Duolingo’s announcement.
Duolingo attributes its rapid course creation to AI. “The development of our first 100 courses took about 12 years, and now we can create and launch nearly 150 new courses in about a year,” states CEO Luis von Ahn. “This showcases how generative AI can provide tangible benefits to our learners.”
The company employs AI to generate and verify content, while human experts are involved “where it’s most impactful, ensuring that each course meets Duolingo’s stringent quality standards,” notes Jessie Becker, Duolingo’s senior director of learning design.
Accelerated AI-driven content production leads to fewer jobs for contract workers. In January 2024, Duolingo terminated nearly 10% of its contractors after implementing AI for translation duties. In a memo earlier this week, von Ahn vowed to further integrate AI into the company’s operations, including in hiring and performance evaluations, and announced plans to eventually phase out all contractors whose roles can be automated by AI.
He compared the company’s investment in AI to its previous decision to focus on mobile applications in 2012. “In 2012, we placed our bet on mobile. While others concentrated on mobile companion apps for websites, we chose to develop a mobile-first platform because we recognized it was the future,” von Ahn explains. “We are making a parallel decision now, and this time the shift is towards AI.”
Duolingo is not alone in utilizing AI for language education. On Tuesday, Google unveiled a collection of language learning tools powered by Gemini, dubbed Little Language Lessons. This three-part experiment is currently available in Google Labs and allows users to describe scenarios to obtain relevant phrases, take a photo to identify words associated with shown objects, or learn slang by watching an automated dialogue between two individuals.
Duolingo will “gradually stop utilizing contractors for tasks that AI can perform,” per an all-hands email from cofounder and CEO Luis von Ahn, indicating the company’s shift to an “AI-first” model. This email was shared on Duolingo’s LinkedIn profile.
As von Ahn states, being “AI-first” implies a need to “reassess much of our operational methods” and that “simply making slight adjustments to systems designed for humans will not suffice.” In line with this shift, the company will introduce “some constructive constraints,” including changes in its relations with contractors, a search for AI applications in hiring and performance assessments, and stipulations such that “headcount will only be allocated if a team cannot further automate their work.”
Von Ahn assures that “Duolingo will continue to be a company that deeply values its employees” and emphasizes that “this isn’t about substituting Duos with AI.” Instead, he states, the adjustments are “focused on removing bottlenecks” to allow employees to concentrate on creative tasks and genuine issues rather than repetitive duties.
“AI is not merely a productivity enhancement,” von Ahn remarks. “It assists us in moving closer to our mission. To teach effectively, we need to generate a significant volume of content, and doing so manually isn’t scalable. One of our best recent decisions was to replace a slow, manual content generation method with an AI-driven process. Without AI, it would take us decades to expand our content to reach more learners. We owe it to our learners to deliver this content promptly.”
von Ahn’s memo is reminiscent of a similar message from Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke that was shared with employees and recently made public. In that communication, Lütke stated that before teams requested additional headcount or resources, they should demonstrate “why they cannot achieve their goals using AI.”
Following the CEO’s declaration that Duolingo would prioritize an ‘AI-first’ approach, the company is set to introduce 148 new language courses.
Duolingo is “more than doubling” its course offerings, an accomplishment it attributes to the use of generative AI, which enabled the development of these courses in “less than a year.”
The company announced today that it will roll out 148 new language courses. “This launch makes Duolingo’s seven most popular non-English languages – Spanish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, and Mandarin – accessible to all 28 supported user interface (UI) languages, significantly broadening learning opportunities for over a billion potential users globally,” the company states.
Duolingo claims that historically, the development of a single new course has taken “years,” but thanks to advances in generative AI, shared content systems, and internal tools, the company was able to construct this new set of courses more swiftly. This new method, referred to internally as “shared content,” enables employees to develop a foundational course and quickly adapt it for “dozens” of different languages.
“By utilizing generative AI to create and validate content, we can direct our expertise where it has the most significant impact, ensuring each course meets Duolingo’s high quality standards,” says Jessie Becker, Duolingo’s senior director of learning design, in a statement.
This announcement follows a recent communication from cofounder and CEO Luis von Ahn to employees, indicating that the company would adopt an “AI-first” strategy and gradually phase out contractors for tasks that AI can perform. AI’s role will now be assessed during the hiring process and included in performance evaluations, with von Ahn stating that “headcount will only be authorized if a team cannot automate more of their work.”
“Our objective has always been to harness technology to teach as effectively as a human tutor, and thanks to AI, we are closer to reaching that goal for the first time,” spokesperson Sam Dalsimer told The Verge in response to inquiries made after von Ahn’s memo. “We’ve been progressing in this direction, and it has significantly transformed our company. One of our best recent decisions was to replace a slow, manual content creation process with an AI-driven approach, guided by our learning design experts. This transition enabled us to create and launch 148 new language courses today.”
Dalsimer notes that Duolingo has been “utilizing and testing AI for years” and emphasizes that it “would not be introducing new course content and adopting this AI-first company strategy if we lacked confidence in AI.” Duolingo is also “continually testing and refining our models” and has “systems in place” to guarantee that AI-generated output meets its standards for course content and aligns with the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages, which is a standard for language proficiency.
Dalsimer mentions that “internally, many teams are already engaging with and using AI in their work, and have been for years.” However, Dalsimer admits that there have been “negative reactions” to von Ahn’s memo. He also remarks that Duolingo has “no plans to decrease full-time staff or hiring” and that “any adjustments to contractor staffing will be evaluated on an individual basis.”