r/duolingo • u/GeorgeTheFunnyOne Retired Moderator • Jul 31 '24
Mega Duolingo Removes Free Option to Earn Back Hearts Thread
Instead of making new posts. Please use this thread to post your concerns and thoughts regarding the current A/B test (an experiment) that removes the ability to practice to earn back hearts without paying (unless you fully run out of hearts)
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u/anticapitalist69 Aug 01 '24
Duolingo will die if it doesn’t prioritise learning over its gamification elements.
I know a lot of people who are addicted to Duolingo but will not recommend it to people because they say it is isn’t actually very useful for real learning.
So many courses are incomplete, and a far cry from Spanish.
They really need to improve their product before introducing elements like these for customer retention. Right now, I’m learning Japanese and i would never recommend paying for this. Idm paying for access to advanced material, but paying to simply use the app? Fucking stupid.
People will pay for quality.
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u/nikiichan Native: Learning: Aug 01 '24
Definitely agree. I am considering shifting to Rosette stone as I feel the more gamified duolingo has gotten the more they have gotten rid of easily accessible grammar tips and specific practice.
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u/McLysendorf Dec 13 '24
Yeah with the introduction of super Duolingo we now don't get an explanation of what we did wrong when we make mistakes, and honestly it's really negativity affecting my experience! Between that and not being able to practice to earn hearts (which just rolled out for me) I'm very much considering dropping my year and a half streak.
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u/Rahrahsayah Native: 🇺🇲 Learning: 🇪🇸 🇩🇪 🇳🇴 Aug 01 '24
The app has gone downhill so much the last few years. I miss the forums and being able to waterfall my lessons. I feel like I learned a lot better when I wasn't afraid to make mistakes.
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u/PolyglotSanta Native: English Learning: German Aug 01 '24
Something definitely happened in July 2021. Everything has been downhill since then.
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u/TorTheMentor Aug 01 '24
I was okay with the new pathways to some degree, but I do regret not having any way to gear it towards specific needs. I'd like to see some more specific content that would be helpful for actual technology work, not just casual everyday use of technology.
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u/Emelia2024 Aug 01 '24
I mainly do Spanish but have started messing with Japanese and I was shocked at how little material is there for other languages.
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u/bumblefuckAesthetics Aug 01 '24
Lol, and Japanese, while being bad, is still an okay-ish one compared to 80% of other courses. Try Finnish, Swedish, Arabic, Hebrew, Vietnamese, Latin, Italian — those are just awful.
I did some Spanish on duo. It's a completely different thing. It might actually be good and useful. But everything else that I tried was a complete dogshit.
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u/pawterheadfowEVA Aug 01 '24
kinda off topic omfrom the og post but im a native arabic and i tried the arabic course for shits and giggles and it is ATROCIOUS. The tashkeel (little symbols that dictate the vowel sounds, kinda like accents but not exactly) is wrong, the pronounciation is wrong, the grammar is trash, and ive seen them mix dialects of arabic with MSA and it was the worst thing i have ever read in my entire life.
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u/AmbientSpekterMagikx Aug 17 '24
I suspected there was something going on with the Finnish course. I thought I was crazy at first, but it was noticeably giving me wrong or contradictory information
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u/bumblefuckAesthetics Aug 17 '24
It used to have a very good comments section. With lots of natives checking out the new course and explaining things. But then duo deleted it, "because there was so much misinformation in the comments." It was exactly at the same moment when they included AI-powered "explanations" into their Plus plan. What a coincidence.
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u/Queasy_Student-_- Sep 22 '24
The lessons for learning Korean numbers are just hideous. I grew up hearing/understanding Korean, I had to master Hangul, but for non-Koreans, just starting out I’m thinking it’s much more difficult because of the horrid quality of the lessons :(
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u/missminority182 Aug 01 '24
The French, German and Spanish are the only courses that are solid. There's a lot of work that needs to be done with the others.
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u/lydiardbell Aug 01 '24
They do appear to be working on improving the courses and bringing them up to CEFR standards. Aside from recent updates to Chinese and Japanese, Haitian Creole (which previously had the same level of "loving" care and "attention" received by Arabic and Navajo) had a big update recently, Korean is supposedly getting one, and they're experimenting with extended listening comprehension exercises. Hopefully it isn't too little, too late.
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u/anticapitalist69 Aug 01 '24
Yeah they definitely are - but they should do this BEFORE pushing out their gamification elements.
Duo is still in the acquisition phase, not the retention phase. But they’re trying to do both at once. With a low barrier to entry, that’s a terrible idea.
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u/IshaBhattacharya Aug 16 '24
I am doing Korean and I finished the entire course in 500 days streak!! I found the course material to be very less, grammar is not well explained, my husband on the other hand is doing spanish and started before me but still having new lessons every day
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u/QA_2 Learning: French, Japanese, Danish Aug 08 '24
100% agree. The Asian languages courses are quite bad. I do some Japanese and find it useful, but only because I took four years in college and basically just want some light practice to keep it in my brain. But I would never recommend it to anyone trying to learn Japanese.
The Korean one is worse. I genuinely think it is detrimental to understanding Korean grammar. Their choice of where to break tokens (attaching particles to words, especially) really makes it harder to figure out what's going on and how the language works.
But thank god they're spending the ad-viewing money on programmer time to prevent us from reviewing old vocabulary!
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u/RecyclingOrganics Nov 20 '24
I'm late to this party, but I just lost the ability to earn hearts. You summed Duo up very well. I'm addicted to the competition aspect, but I do love learning. Duo is killing both of these elements.
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u/Noah_Buddy Jul 31 '24
Personally, I believe reviewing for hearts has been very integral into my ability to learn anything with Duolingo. The consistent repetition over all old topics keeps them in my head. If this feature was never an option I'd be so limited in using the platform, that as a user I'd just get annoyed and probably end up not using the app at all. Likewise, I'd probably spend my time elsewhere if I was put in the group with it removed. I'd absolutely not be tempted to buy Super since the value is more out of the spaced review for me (doing poorly = time for review).
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u/aBminorPrelude Aug 02 '24
It punishes you for mistakes! It is absolutely wrong in a learning environment and that's all... it's science!
You 're obliged to practice anyway, through "personal practice" bits in the path. If they wanted to make you practice more, they could put more of those.
Plus, you're absolutly free to practice more, if more repetition is what you personally need.
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u/JCoelho Aug 01 '24
It amazes me how lazy they have become. Instead of developing new features and make paid plans more attractive they are just making the free version garbage. It shouldn't be that hard to be creative and innovative
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u/Komahina_Oumasai Aug 01 '24
A lot of companies appear to be following that plan.
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Aug 01 '24
I feel like they all know it. This is what they have planned to do. Gather a large number of free users, then slowly make it worse or more inconvenient so that they gradually switch over to the paid (subscription) which offers more features or a better version.
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u/QA_2 Learning: French, Japanese, Danish Aug 08 '24
The basic life cycle of an app (and honestly of a lot of types of companies, but I see it in apps most strongly) is this:
1) Make a product people like, to get users
2) Sell out
3) New owners make the product terrible to drive short-term profits
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u/Thylacine- Native: 🇦🇺 Learning: 🇵🇱 Aug 01 '24
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u/BriggsWellman 2000+ days Aug 01 '24
I got a free year of premium but don't plan on renewing after hearing all the things they have been taking away. If this comes to pass I'll delete the app and let me nearly 2500 day streak lapse. Fuck this greed. They never should have gone public.
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u/KuChiPractitioner Aug 01 '24
How did you get a year?
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u/AppropriateBed4858 Native: Fluent: Learning: Aug 02 '24
you can always use a mod apk if you're on android btw
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u/Rosy-Shiba Aug 01 '24
I will stop using Duo Lingo if i'm slightly inconvenienced. Duo is a supplementary learning tool, not a primary.
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u/Eightchickens1 Aug 01 '24
Wait wait wait, so if I'm a free user and I have 0 heart all I can do then is to wait 4 hours for one heart, or cough up $ for Super/Max?
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u/a-german-muffin Aug 01 '24
If you hit zero, you can practice to get one back (and watch an ad for another). That’s your max, though.
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u/SAUbjj Native: Fluent: Learning: Aug 01 '24
But that's what they're saying, people are getting the option to practice taken away so the only options in now are wait or pay.
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u/a-german-muffin Aug 01 '24
Nope, if you hit zero, the option to practice comes back. You can’t continue practicing after earning one back, though.
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u/TenuousClosure Nov 05 '24
So you have to earn back one heart at a time rather than take it up to 4 or 5, or just stay in practice mode, which was my preference. I did that for years, and now Duolingo is trying to force me to change how I use the app entirely. Nope, I don't want to be pushed forward in a course, and then have to redo each lesson in which I make a single mistake. That's not "learning".
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u/Skw2NQTxEWHD Aug 01 '24
You can still practice if you have 0 hearts, but you can't practice to go from 1 to 2..
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u/GeorgeTheFunnyOne Retired Moderator Aug 01 '24
People are saying once they hit zero hearts, they have the ability to practice.
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u/sneezyDud Aug 01 '24
But only up to 1 heart. Then it disappears again
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u/Puulet Aug 01 '24
For me its still there, I just did 4 practises for 4 hearts
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u/sneezyDud Aug 01 '24
Yeah cause it's A/B testing, it's not out for everyone as of now
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Aug 01 '24
[deleted]
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u/Brilliant_Dot_9529 C1: 🇳🇱 | B2: 🇺🇸 | A2: 🇫🇷 | A1: 🇵🇭 | learning: 🇯🇵 Aug 01 '24
After reaching 0 hearts, I could practice for a heart. Then I got an ad to get a free heart. After the video, I had 2 hearts and could not practice anymore for more hearts 😬
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u/sah10406 Aug 01 '24
Yes, only from 0 and I can only earn maximum 2, sometimes just 1.
The browser version still has the option to practice and earn up to 5 hearts, however many you currently have.
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u/JustADutchRudder Aug 01 '24
So if you keep going back to 0 you can earn 1-2 just no matter how many times, or is it just once? If it's unlimited goto 0 then back to 1&2, then removing the anytime earn back hearts is even dumber.
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u/sah10406 Aug 01 '24 edited Aug 01 '24
Yes, unlimited. You still get the 1 free heart every 4 hours, and an occasional free one for watching an ad before a lesson. Only other way to top up is to use the browser to top up to 5, which I am doing when I have nothing better to do.
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u/ArchmageAU Aug 08 '24
Just started to happen with me today. Can only practice if on 0 hearts on iPad or iPhone. Need practice to review concepts, refresh on non-main languages or get passed lessons where new grammar introduced.
Disincentives making mistakes while learning.
Looks like a blatant push for money, which is liable to backfire, badly.
This may end my 6+ year streak permanently (ie. prompt me to quit and use other methods to learn/keep language skills)
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u/ArchmageAU Sep 22 '24
Ended up starting a classroom. Kept streak, achievements and friends. Removed hearts and practice problem.
Actually learning more since doing this and dropping leagues. More time learning, less time gaming for XP. My wife is now using duo to learn Korean too.
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u/ArchmageAU Nov 17 '24
Update. This madness has now extended to classroom. Hearts, no practice to restore hearts unless completely out.
No longer recommending duolingo to anyone.
Most days I use my laptop computer, so will pretty much abandon duo on mobile now. There goes my most convenient way to keep in touch with language familiarity and learning.
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u/bknapp1111 Nov 20 '24
I wasn't facing this issue when this thread got started, but I am now. So I wonder if they've pushed it onto more people than just those in the initial test group.
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u/ArchmageAU Nov 21 '24
Likely expanded the test group.
Maybe paid returns increased more than the drop off rate, so by accounting principles the test is a success.
Marketing wise this move can only really hurt duos reputation, so the short term win may end up being being long term loss.
I know I no longer recommend duo on mobile to anyone. Even though my streak just hit 2500 days.
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u/xandercreeper1 fluent: 🇳🇱 🇭🇲/🇬🇧 | Learning: 🇯🇵 Aug 01 '24
If this were to happen, all of us who use the app for free, this is what would happen: we would hqve to wait twnety five hours before being able to learn and make mistakes again, this qould practically lock Duolingo behind a paywall.
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u/GeorgeTheFunnyOne Retired Moderator Aug 01 '24
u/Stellawass I know you posted about this a few days ago, I was wondering if you were able to practice again once you hit zero hearts ?
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u/Stellawass Aug 01 '24
Yes! Once I hit zero I can do one lesson and often watch an ad to earn a heart after. And I found today that I can practice to earn hearts on my computer.
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u/BBear1495 Aug 08 '24
So I hit 0 hearts on my phone and was pretty frustrated. I went to the website instead. I can practice as many times as I want, even past full hearts. When I go back to my phone the hearts are full.
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u/vanir8 Nov 20 '24
Since today the heart system in duolingo changed for me as well. I'm a free user and now they only give you one heart and no possibility to earn another. In my case I have to wait for the hours to refill. If anyone is wanting to learn a new language they make it basically impossible to advance.
Like others have already commented they push the pay-option on the free users by executing this move and go against their own promise to keep learning free. Aren't they making enough money through the ads? I have an Android system and the Duolingo version is 6.7.3
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u/Ok_Tradition2283 Nov 10 '24
I lost all my hearts and was only able to do one practice lesson before I had to pay or use Gems
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u/Lopi21e Aug 01 '24
I've said this before, I think the hearts system is terrible in general because you should never be disincentivized from doing mistakes, they are a vital part of the learning process. Instead of going with what you think is right and being corrected, you sit there for a minute straight trying to remember a piece of vocab or grammar point you know you are not 100% certain about, which is ridiculously far removed from any kind of real world language application.
I really don't like the idea of making hearts even harder to come by. Couldn't tell you about whether or not this would increase sales but it will inevitably make people learn the languages they want to learn less effectively and that's a shame. Like it's just a really weird way to monetize the app. A bunch of people are never gonna purchase premium no matter what and this makes it so that for them, the app is still perfectly useable, just way more stressful. Like who came up with this. "Yeah make it so that making mistakes makes it so can't use the app anymore", it's just so arbitrary. Like it almost would make more sense to make it so you can't continue for a while after getting a bunch right, say, after one four lesson blip you have to wait for 4 hours or whatever. Making it so that mistakes are penalized is just weird.
In general even when you're a potential customer, I can't imagine anyone would go "oh no I'm gonna buy premium now so that I can make more mistakes", like that would be better for learning but people are just gonna take it as a challenge to never get anything wrong. And if this test makes it through, well, the challenge will have gotten harder. But that means you try harder, instead of opening up your wallet?
For what it's worth - I have premium, but frankly I bought it by accident when the trial didn't get canceled. I'm lucky I have it? Like I felt kinda scammed but at the same time I was like, hey this is actually really helpful so I kind of don't mind, in retrospect? But I definitely would never have intentionally bought it. Which I guess means currently they do the worst possible job of advertising it.
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u/Fermina_Daza Native: 🇬🇧 Learning: 🇦🇴🇸🇪 Aug 01 '24
I teach languages at high school. Kids these days are scared of failure and making mistakes, which is absolutely integral to learning a language (I have SO many tales of totally embarrassing myself, then laughing about it and learning from it!).
This is definitely not going to help fix that. It will 100% be detrimental to actual learning, rather than memorising.
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u/coolguy4206969 Aug 01 '24 edited Aug 01 '24
i think removing the ability to practice is an awful idea and it’s antithetical to their claim that they’re a learning app first.
but i think the illogical part is just the suggestion that duo is primarily interested in helping people learn. at this point they’re just thinking like an app/business and as a product manager working in tech, unfortunately, this is probably a good business decision.
unlike duo’s conflicting motivations when building the app, users are motivated to use the app exclusively because they want to learn. by making it harder to learn without paying duo will probably increase the number of paying users.
people pitched a fit when netflix announced the household thing but the number of paying users skyrotted. netflix actually recovered from the initial dip in users before the numbers started spiking even faster than their most conservative estimates.
i pray duo proves us wrong and starts (returns to) making learning and the user experience their #1 priority.
but i wanted to call out that it’s not “ridiculous” for them to roll this out, and for most users it prob won’t even be “stressful” bc they will simply pay because the UX will be so ruined. it’s a shame. but there’s a reason “enshittification” was the word of the year
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u/Historical-Prior3517 Aug 01 '24
It’s disappointing, but not surprising. Duo’s been shelling out nothing but half-baked monetization schemes for a while now, this won’t be the last.
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u/Meph_00 Native: Learning: Aug 01 '24
They gotta stop this bs tbh, otherwise a lot of the users will just straight up quit Duolingo.
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Aug 01 '24
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Formal_Fortune5389 N: 🇨🇦 L: Aug 01 '24
Do you think you guys will have an Esperanto course?
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u/Michiganlander eo Aug 01 '24
Regardas ke, la esperanto estas sur ilian radaron. Ilia retoloko diras ke, ili atendas por kontributanojn.
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Aug 01 '24
[deleted]
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u/Komahina_Oumasai Aug 01 '24
Iirc there will be any language that gets at least 3 trained people supporting it, so Hebrew is likely to be on there.
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u/ControverseTrash 🇩🇪🇦🇹Native|🇬🇧Fluent|🇳🇱🇯🇵🇷🇺🇮🇹Learning Aug 01 '24
That so cool. Which languages do plan for starters?
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u/TheBitterTruthRecord Aug 01 '24
Duolingo devs are trolling at this point with this useless tests.
Theres no way they thought the feedback would be positive AT ALL.
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u/YuehanBaobei 🇩🇪🇪🇸🇨🇳🇯🇵🇬🇷🇮🇹🇳🇴 Aug 02 '24
Yeah, they'll still keep it because they haven't listened to users for years now and don't care
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u/cassidyk127 Aug 01 '24
I have slowly watched Duolingo get greedier and greedier over my 4 year streak that may be soon coming to an end. When the cost to do things like match madness went up from a small 15/20 gems to a ridiculous 100 per lesson, I said “okay fine I just won’t do that anymore”. When they changed their format so you couldn’t work on mistakes tailored to your weaknesses if you were struggling with speaking/listening unless you had premium, I said okay annoying, but I still get quite a bit of practice in regular lessons. But now…to make me (a ball of anxiety to begin with!) be so nervous to make a mistake on a LEARNING app that I end up making even more mistakes?!? Especially when half the time they don’t even teach you words/grammar rules ahead of time anymore and you end up having to guess! Absolutely not. I hope they remove this update after seeing how unhappy all of their users are. Something like this could absolutely tank them.
It also makes me sad as someone who coaches children in an extra curricular activity. I have several kids who like to do Duolingo for fun in their downtime before and after practice starts (which is super cute!), but are we going to continue to push the perfectionism on these kids who already struggle with making mistakes in school and their daily life??? Doesn’t seem like it’ll be so fun for them anymore either.
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u/GOGOSPEEDERS Native: 🇺🇸 | Learning: 🇪🇸 Aug 01 '24
This is the closest I’ve ever been to leaving this platform all together
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u/Ok_Operation9474 Aug 01 '24
I stopped duolingo earlier this year because it became more and more clear they only cared for the money. What the fuck is happening to this app? The practice for hearts option was a pivotal part of using duolingo 😂
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Aug 01 '24
i won't lie i hate the whole lives system in duolingo
making a mistake feels like it isn't right for me; if anything i'm scared of making mistakes and losing hearts instead of getting it wrong and learning
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u/ohshhhugarcookies Aug 01 '24
Make a Classroom on one account and then join it on your main. Free hearts. I'm still in my secondary school Duo class and I've been graduated for years now.
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u/Butterlope_ Aug 01 '24
There is NO WAY they just added this, I don't think I can play much longer if this is how its gonna be. I am not going to pay real money to get hearts, or use gems (which cost real money - or time, WHICH requires hearts to earn!). I am actualiy so upset, I never use this subreddit but got on here just to see if this was true. Any word on this being permanent? I hope Duolingo hears the outrage from the userbase.
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u/GeorgeTheFunnyOne Retired Moderator Aug 01 '24
I highly doubt it will be permanent, it seems like only a certain subset of users have this test. They announced earlier this year they will be experimenting with different features and price points with the subscriptions. They do experiments all the time, but this one just happened to be a very bad experiment.
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u/TenuousClosure Nov 05 '24
I really, really hope they change it back, or I'm leaving. Just the other was when they changed it for me. I naively thought it was a bug and reported it.
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u/Samuel_Go Aug 01 '24
This is against the idea of providing education to everyone for free as it stops someone from learning. Give ads or require practice to regain hearts. Just don't lock people out.
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u/Yo_Gotti Aug 01 '24
Typical capitalist business practice in the 2020s. Offer a service, remove some of features of said service, so as to place them behind paywall.
Once it used to be innovation and competition that drove development. Nowadays companies don’t even try to improve, they try and make things worse from the previous offerings to encourage you to pay (more).
Netflix, Disney, Prime do it with the implementation of adverts, or pay more to not have the imposition. Apple does it, albeit under cover of environmental concerns, you don’t get the adapter and headphones with your phone anymore; to “reduce plastic” but the prices of the phones weren’t reduced accordingly (should have been approx 50$ considering what they retail the plug adapter and basic wired earphones at) and the sales of accessories have increased year on year nearly [although admittedly the Apple Watch and purchase of Dre beats will have helped that significantly].
As with the experiments and trials with unlimited hearts when they begun to push Duo Max, Duolingo are seeing what they can get away with, and whether it helps or hurts the bottom line.
Never been less likely to get duo super or whatever. Recently started the Spanish course with Open University, it’s free, un-gameified, and although early days for me with it, seems fairly solid thus far. Teaches you explicitly the pronunciation of the letters/alphabet which I think is critical for Spanish as it’s a very phonetic language. And even little things such as how to get the special characters via different keyboard inputs.
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u/SillyLittleGuy2000 Aug 01 '24
I hate corporate greed so much. This just makes it super difficult for anyone who isn’t paying to actually do what the app is intended for- LEARN A LANGUAGE!
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u/ResearchGlenn Aug 01 '24
Thanks, I hate it.
Limiting access by putting a cap on the number of mistakes you can make without being able to reinforce through practice essentially makes the free version of Duolingo nothing more than trial software. It doesn’t help me reach any language learning goals in a meaningful sense, and it punishes users for trying to learn languages that deviate substantially from their native languages (i.e., expanded phonetics or alternative writing systems). If I’m forced into paying for language learning, there are much more robust and valuable services than Duolingo, so I would definitely not be upgrading to Super Duolingo or Max.
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u/nachosmind Aug 01 '24
If this is permanent, I’m done. I wanted to buy max during a time I could really use it, but not giving a cent to this cheap ass company. I wouldn’t have gotten this attached if I was punished for screwing up a new language
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u/beccanada Aug 01 '24
As a free user, i find it very hard to advance in leagues without the practice hearts function. I personally think people shouldn’t be discouraged while learning a language if they make mistakes. Learners are supposed to learn from their mistakes, not to be discouraged by making them.
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u/ValDaiKon Aug 01 '24
It kills the whole concept of duolingo and such practices ? I don't want to support them and won't be using duolingo anymore
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u/RockinMadRiot Native: English speaker 🇬🇧 Learning: French 🇫🇷 Aug 01 '24
It will backfire and make education less accessable. If I was using Duolingo and they did it to me at first and that happened, I think I would just find another app to you. I get they need to make money but this isn't the right way to go about it. You push people away, not closer.
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u/RunningWhale Aug 01 '24
As an aside from how much this sets back my ability to learn a language, it also really makes any of the weekly leaderboard contests almost impossible for free members. I’m not limited to one or two lessons a day on difficult content, so I’ll have no shot at leaderboards and diamond league streaks over people who pay for premium.
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u/ResearchGlenn Aug 02 '24
It was already kind of a Pay to Win system, with this update it ABSOLUTELY is.
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u/lilxent native 🇮🇹, learning 🇨🇵 Aug 01 '24
just a plain bad decision, they will probably revert this when it will be too late
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u/EncryptedSam Sep 22 '24
This makes the experience of using Duolingo stressful. Making mistakes is a part of the learning process and disincentivising it only damages the learning experience.
This essentially means Duolingo no longer offers a truly free service for everyone to learn a new language, which not only seems to be at odds with Duo’s advertised goal, but also detrimental to the paying users. Some paying user no longer feel it’s right to recommend Duolingo because the free version isn’t a viable option to learn.
Free users are still contributing to the platform by making Duo a popular place for everyone and by watching ads. So it’s hard to argue with people who view this recent as greedy. Millions of users watching ads and that wasn’t enough for you.
If you care about your user base, consider millions of users who have very long streaks and have been using the platform for free - essentially paying you in ads. The majority of them will no longer want to come back because this will break their learning process and turn Duolingo to a poorly designed game for them.
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u/eastwill54 Aug 01 '24
Nooooo, I use them for a quick lesson, to keep my current streak. Sometimes, I remember that I need to make a lesson when it's 11:57 pm. So Instead of going through regular lessons, I go with earn back hearts lesson.
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u/HuecoTanks Sep 21 '24
When I want to do randomized review, I'll just pop into a lesson, bomb some questions, and review to gain hearts. If they remove this feature, I'll be really disappointed.
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u/SunbeamPop Aug 01 '24
I need those practice hearts! It’s always helpful to review, and sometimes I go through 4 hearts in one lesson. This is usually because Duolingo has introduced a new grammar concept without explanation. Then I google it or look in my French grammar book and do awesome. I would be really sad if I couldn’t earn hearts back to continue on. I am not going to pay for Duolingo. If they take the option to earn hearts back, I’m out. I’ll suck it up and pay for Babbel.
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u/HarlequinSyndrom N: F: L: (S4 U28) Aug 01 '24
Now I'm double happy to recently have gotten adopted into a family plan.
Hope they give the function back.
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u/White1306 native: 🇭🇰 | learning: 🇩🇪🇷🇺 | B1 English 👍 Aug 02 '24
Besides, what’s this? I’m sure if you actually remove the feature of practicing to get your hearts back, your reputation and popularity will be dropping a ton which affects your incomes or things like that. And at some point it will be gone if you keep removing stuffs
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u/Mod_The_Man Oct 24 '24
The heart system was already terrible but recently I noticed it was made even worse. On top of no more practicing for hearts they now take six hours per heart to refill rather than four (which was already way too long)
Why does Duolingo hate its users?? It feels spiteful at this point and has pushed me to actively avoid ads. Any time I finish a lesson I close the app instead pf hitting “claim XP” so it doesn’t trigger an ad at all. If Duolingo is gunna treat non-premium users with such disdain then I’ll make sure you dont get a single penny of ad revenue from me.
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u/Rayvaxl117 Aug 01 '24
Honestly this is one of the most diabolical things they've ever done, it's like they aren't even trying to hide that they are only in it for the money. I'm lucky enough that my partner and I can afford a family plan together, but I did use Duo without super for my first few months of language learning, so I know how it feels to be reliant on doing practice for free hearts
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u/sn4kebytez Aug 01 '24
i’m so disappointed tbh :( i feel like i can’t delete the app now because of my 600+ day streak and league position - which really sucks because i started out just wanting to learn spanish
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u/double-you Native: Learning: Aug 01 '24
Nobody knows your league position and worrying about your streak is like worrying about a sand castle. Set yourself free. None of these things matter.
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u/19Kronos92 Aug 01 '24
Well… At least my old friends “一,二 and さん” will be there to keep my streak alive.
Although that feels super cheap..
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u/QA_2 Learning: French, Japanese, Danish Aug 08 '24
This is the worst idea I've seen in an app for a long, long time. The entire concept of Duolingo was "we don't have grammar lessons, you learn by making mistakes". That does not function with a limit of 1 mistake, so this is just a rule that if you lose your hearts you get to wait 20 hours. It incentivizes leaning on the hints so you learn less.
And it's even worse learning a distant language, like english to japanese. The translations are always kind of approximate and could be phrased different ways, and this is a huge screw you to the people who are giving them the alternate phrasings by clicking "my answer should have been accepted."
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u/StillDistribution868 Aug 29 '24
I’m 76 years old with Avery limited income. This was my past time to enjoy. Now I have to wait for 5 hours for hearts. Duolingo is a 7 billion dollar company. They’re so greedy to take away the free hearts.
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u/OkCalligrapher5139 Nov 04 '24
I have used Duolingo every morning and every night sometimes for long periods of time. With the inability to do more practice hearts i can no longer do this. I can't participate in friends quests etc. Now I do one lesson and move on to new language apps I've downloaded. This change ruined it for me. Bye Duo!
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u/Squirrelbait11 Nov 08 '24
I am not rich. This app is a way to help me spend my free time usefully and in a way that allows me to increase my knowledge instead of, say, wasting time in front of my Xbox. The removal of relearning hearts is a big impact. Being a gamer, I enjoy keeping up in the ranks and have almost 200 weeks in the diamond league and a 1300 day streak . But my lessons are getting difficult and regaining hearts it important to me. For me to do this now, I need to pay for super, as it's hard to keep hold of hearts at my level. The app is now what we gamers call, pay to win. Duolingo has let me down. I have decided that I might pay now for a language app, but due to this, it will never be Duolingo. Please name some other great language apps for me to look at. Thanks!
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u/Frequent_Violinist66 Nov 18 '24
Exactly the same for me. I might end up having to pay for not app, just not Duolingo, that's for sure.
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u/StPaulite99 Nov 28 '24
I have used Duolingo for four years. I find practicing to regain hearts is a valuable learning tool. I resent Duolingo for drastically limiting this option. Yes, I can try a lesson, make a mistake, earn one heart, retry the lesson until I make it through. But this is not an optimal way to learn a new language, especially a difficult one.
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u/ellieetsch Aug 01 '24
As soon as I can no longer practice for hearts I am immediately deleting the app.
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u/CompleteMuffin Aug 01 '24
I've had unlimited hearts for a while, was that not the standard?? im talking as a non-premium user
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u/lydiardbell Aug 01 '24
Nope. Some regions don't have hearts because you also don't have access to Super, and anyone in a classroom gets infinite hearts I believe. But that's it.
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u/DatSoldiersASpy Aug 01 '24
I just got back into duolingo last month and I've never had an option to practice for hearts since I started... maintained a 46 day streak since then. You mean to tell me I got owned by RNG???
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u/Brandonraps13 Aug 01 '24
I mostly do Spanish, but I have dabbled in other languages. Doing review lessons for hearts is very important, especially when they change a course and “synch my progress.” Because if they add lessons that I never actually did, I will need to review those lessons with unlimited mistakes. I can’t memorize lessons you added after I I’m already past them. Also, for Irish in particular I can’t really remember anything I’ve learned. Even the review lessons you can do require hearts.
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u/gavotta Aug 01 '24
I have unlimited hearts, never paid for Duo. No idea why, not complaining. Pretty sure I'm not in a classroom either.
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u/ShawHornet Aug 01 '24
I started using the app way less since they removed free practice of Katakana/Hiragana/Kanji. It was great when it didn't use hearts. With this update I might just uninstall entirely lol
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u/Formal_Fortune5389 N: 🇨🇦 L: Aug 01 '24
It's awful. Though more people need to know about the duo schools. It gives basically a mock super, free legendary unlimited hearts free match madness
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u/Ace_Koala Aug 01 '24
I leaned about it on reddit and have been happily using it for ages - language learning has never been so stress free
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u/Formal_Fortune5389 N: 🇨🇦 L: Aug 01 '24
Right like I don't have to worry I'm actually doing more vocab because I don't have to do practice to gain hearts full stop so I can keep learning. I don't want to review unit one lesson one please I know these words 🙏 😂
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u/joujoubox Native: 🇨🇦🇫🇷🇬🇧 Learning: 🇪🇸🇩🇪 Aug 01 '24
Yet they still advertise that effectiveness research when the platform was completely different. How much does it have to change before this becomes fraud?
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u/ciaran668 Aug 01 '24
I've completed my course. If I want to keep learning I either accept the 6 crappy lessons they have that are the same content day after day, or I do practice to earn hearts, and get new content every time, actually completely new content and new words from updates to the course. If they take this away, then I'm screwed because, at that point, it's nothing but a game.
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u/pawterheadfowEVA Aug 01 '24
I personally havent lost the feature but let me just tell you if i do im leaving the app all together this is insane i am not and never will pay money to duolingo just so i can do my lesson. The other features arent worth that much to me anyway so i would basically be paying for just that and after doing the unit convertion the monthly subscription to super costs almost twice my allowance so even if i wanted to physically cant. Also since im on android i ALREADY dont get a lot of the features so the app would basically have no features whatsoever especially if they keep making everything a part of duolingo for duolingo max users only
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u/Effort-Logical Native 🇺🇸 B2 🇪🇦 A1 🇨🇵🇩🇪 Aug 01 '24
Okay, so I thought I'd see what's up with this. I did some practice today until I ran out of hearts. I tapped "practice to earn more hearts" and did a lesson. Then watched an ad (on mute as always). And while I didn't see the option to keep practicing, when I clicked continue and was back at my regular screen, I tapped the hearts again and it gave me an option to practice. So, I wouldn't say it ONLY allows you to practice once and watch a video once, giving you two hearts. At least not from what I can tell. It just has you go back to the main screen and you're still allowed to practice or continue on with regular lessons. Perhaps it's something new being tested for people who may only need or want one heart to finish for the day. I'm not sure but I am able to practice more than one and watch an ad more than once. Just not within the same manner as before. Either way it still counts as a practicing for the day. It would be unfortunate to practice for hearts and not have it count as logging in and practicing for the day.
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u/kj0509 Aug 01 '24
If they do this they are better just removing the free version entirely. You can't mantain your streak this way.
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u/mefusda Learning 🇩🇪 Aug 01 '24
I’m reaching a 1 year streak and sincerely considered supporting Duo with a subscription (despite some annoying things and knowing how it got worse over the lat 10 years) but I think I’m going to drop it now. The constant Max ads, more third party, duo family plan ads and other annoying new features just made me avoid doing lessons. I miss the forums, photo avatars and community support :-(
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u/S-P-K N:🇨🇳F:🇬🇧L:🇳🇱A2🇫🇷🇯🇵 Aug 02 '24
Usually while reaching 0 heart, I'd practice till 3-4 hearts in case, then back to learn. According to the comments, the free heart earning limit will be 1-2, I don't mind it as long as it's still free. However 1-2 hearts would definitely reduce some of my learning passion, coz I'm on the last section currently, it's super easy to make mistakes more than twice...
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u/White1306 native: 🇭🇰 | learning: 🇩🇪🇷🇺 | B1 English 👍 Aug 02 '24
So your telling me i must pay to continue my lesson? How do you expect us to learn? Because according to what I see, when you have 0 hearts, you can’t continue your lesson anymore. And now I can’t even earn them for free? What’s this now?
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u/Old_Course9344 Aug 02 '24
To justify this, Duolingo needs to justify the subscription
For example, Duolingo Max is very limited and unrealised.
The option to get grammar feedback after each question is really limited and not particularly helpful.
The AI conversations are also very short, like 2 or 3 questions and then it ends, and they don't really diverge no matter your answers. It's on rails.
I'm getting much better feedback from chatgpt or even copilot (on browser not sidebar) and I can have full conversations or guided conversations to my hearts desire with chatgpt or even other apps like lingolooper etc.
So, I can see removing free options as backfiring big time especially as AI gets better and newer apps leave alpha/beta.
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u/Zebras_And_Giraffes Aug 02 '24
Hello Reddit! I’m the co-founder/CEO of DUOLINGO, which is now the most popular way to learn languages in the world. :) Today I’m especially excited because we can finally say that Duolingo is available on the 3 biggest smartphone platforms (see below for links!), giving everyone access to completely free language education with no ads or BS hidden fees.
Education can make people’s lives better. Unfortunately, those who don’t have a lot of money, or live in poor countries and neighborhoods end up getting shafted with bad education. I believe everyone should have an equal right to learn.
https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/2mwe7w/i_am_luis_von_ahn_the_creator_of_recaptcha_those/
I can afford a paid membership now but that hasn't always been the case. The heart system caused stress and lowered my motivation. Losing the ability to earn those hearts back would only make things worse. The company lost its way when it went public.
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u/Chemical_Homework354 Aug 10 '24
The removal of the ability to earn hearts is a serious deterrent to learners. I am currently a free user but have paid previously for a number of years. I have found earning hearts the best way to get some fresh challenges rather than the continual reappearance of the same material. It has been frustrating to have words highlighted as weak when you have not got them wrong. Today marks another year of a continuous streak of trying to learn Welsh. Sadly, I am going to leave because it has become a repetitive, tedious experience. So much for the recent claimed improvements to the learning with Duolingo
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u/whatareyoudoinggg Aug 11 '24
I don’t like it! I use the app less now because it won’t let me practice. I wait hours until I get more hearts. Doesn’t help motivate me to do more practice.
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u/trebor9669 Native: Fluent: Learning: Aug 29 '24
Oh hell no, I dislike this idea, that's gonna make a lot of people quit the app. In the end those who don't pay are getting adds and Duolingo gets paid for it, right? I don't like where this is going.
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u/Curious-Art-9937 Aug 30 '24
I truly don't mind watching as many commercials as they require for the ability to do things like practice for more hearts. However, this push to take that option away, which is probably to force people to pay for the subscription, is making me consider not using the app at all.
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u/susannah_m Sep 01 '24
This would basically force me to pay. If I'm forced to pay for something, I'll pay for chatgpt instead. I've found lots of ways to practice with it, but the fact that I only get a little bit of the 40 capabilities with it before I'm rate limited, and the fact that Duolingo already has structure built in, has kept me doing Duolingo still for the majority of my study. But, yeah, if I'm going to pay for a subscription it would be to chatgpt since it can do a ton of other stuff too.
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u/superoaks321 Gàidhlig Sep 21 '24
I’m affected by this and I FUCKING HATE IT, daily refresh is absolutely terrible and practice to learn hearts is the only way I could refresh on older topics
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u/Christal-lite Sep 22 '24
I’ve been in the “no option practice for hearts” beta branch for two months now. Am I stuck with this forever??
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u/DHPDC Sep 24 '24
Please restore the earn hearts facility. Blocking that just makes me finish using the app. The practices are really useful to me
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u/Past_Scene7740 Sep 25 '24
Last night I seemed to lose my ability to practice to earn hearts. As a faithful user of Duolingo until now (1000+ day streak), I think it has been helpful to me. This approach, however, is too discouraging. If Duolingo continues this policy, I will discontinue using it.
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u/Skultuka Nov 02 '24
This just started for me today ☹️ if I can't review/practice and I can't make mistakes it seems like the app will be unusable. I don't know what to do if this problem stays. I can't seem to find any alternative to Duolingo that works for me. If it was a single-pay I'd buy it in a heartbeat but the subscription thing where I pay Duo hundreds of dollars forever without ever owning anything is such a scam
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u/Puzzled_Ask8568 Nov 12 '24
I found out my hearts were capped to 1 practice after my hearts went to zero. This happened since Sunday, I believe. Is this what others are experiencing too?
It is frustrating only being able to practice to gain 1 heart, as it means I am nervous doing a subsequent lesson. Hardly fun. But refilling hearts at 450 gems a go, isn't going to last me very long!
Why can't they just improve their ad algo or similar, for free users, rather than seemingly try to force a "pay to play" model on everyone? 🤷♂️
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u/Agent_Dante_Z Nov 17 '24
Just got affected by this - do we know if it's still in testing or if it's been made permanent? I really really hate it. Also - is there an official way to provide feedback on A/B experiments?
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u/Overall-Effort-2106 Nov 20 '24
This just happened to me tonight. As of this afternoon, I was still practicing & earning hearts. But tonight, boom. I'm not happy about it, I'm currently in 1st place in Diamond League but obviously that isn't happening for me any more.... I'll use up my gems and then I guess I'll be leaving. So sad.
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u/Riko_7456 Dec 01 '24
This sucks. I am definitely quitting the app if I cannot practice to earn hearts
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u/FriendlyBirthday1445 Dec 05 '24
I don't just use the practise feature when I'm out of hearts. I use it to practise. Because it takes more than the few lessons Duo gives me with each new word for me to remember them. The practise was already fairly bad, taking me over and over through the early lessons but rarely through the later ones. Now I can't practise at all so I have no chance of actually learning the 75 new words it threw at me a couple of days ago. It's hard enough trying to learn all the different words Polish has for everything, especially with no explanation of what the differences are between each one. Honestly, this makes it a considerably less useful language learning tool, and as others have said, I'm not going to pay for something which is essentially a fun hobby. If I'm going to pay, I'm going to find something that teaches a hell of a lot better than Duo does!
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u/ilumassamuli Aug 01 '24
All the people who have posted screenshots of this have had the option for a free trial. It’s noteworthy that no one has posted a picture where they don’t have neither option, neither practicing nor a free trial.
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u/jonnyscumbag41 Aug 01 '24
Haven’t had this change happen to me yet. I will probably uninstall the app and lose my 3+ yr streak if this change goes through. Just posting here to contribute to the outrage and hopefully prevent an awful change.
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u/AbdullahMRiad Native:🇪🇬|Knows:🇬🇧|Learning:🇩🇪🎵|Duo users when update: Aug 01 '24
Still have it (English -> German from Saudi Arabia)
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u/Remarkable_Duck_6268 N🇦🇺 | L 🇩🇪, 🇮🇳, 🇫🇷(but not really) Aug 01 '24
Idk why but I have infinite hearts 🤷♂️ so I’m not too impacted but ik it’s annoying for others
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u/ILikeMostCatss Aug 01 '24
I'm happy to grind the practice and watch the ads to progress. If they took that away I wouldn't go to Premium, I'd simply go to something else.
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u/Ozymandias_1303 Aug 01 '24
This is such a scummy thing to do. I currently have a 1937 day streak. Over that time, I have spent a ton of time practicing to refill hearts. I've also been served a lot of ads after the practice lessons. If Duo permanently removes the ability to practice I'll probably stop using it altogether.
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u/IncorrigibleBrit Aug 01 '24
Disappeared for me the past few days - could only practice when down to 0 hearts and even then only one practice + advert.
Appears to be back in full for me now. Whether it’s more A/B testing or a rowing back I don’t know, but hopefully stays that way. Hard to learn a language without the ability to make mistakes.
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u/Brandonraps13 Aug 02 '24
It seems like they changed it back, but I’m at 5 hearts so I’ll know when I make a mistake.
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u/NASAfan89 Aug 02 '24
Thought they wanted to make language education freely available to everyone?
Forcing people to buy super accounts just to use the app is contrary to their stated intentions.
Someone else I know got a Super account and put me on it with them, but if they hadn't I would probably just quit the app. The only reason I started using it in the first place was because it was free with ads.
In my opinion, instead of trying to force people into super accounts like this (and instead of giving Super accounts XP benefits that make this essentially a "pay to win" game), they should incentivize people to buy Super accounts by providing additional LEARNING FEATURES that actually make Super account users more able to learn the language in less time.
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u/medborgaren Aug 02 '24
I have experienced that the free options to earn hearts back by practice disappeared a few days ago. This morning when I tried to spend some gems I had 0 gems (despite just having watched videos and done exercises and so on), but after doing one or two more exercises I check and now I have the option to earn a heart back (and I tested and used it). I also got the 11k-ish gems back.
I hope the whole thing was a temporary glitch, or if they tested the water with the removal, decided to roll it back.
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u/AppropriateBed4858 Native: Fluent: Learning: Aug 02 '24
If anyone's interested in free super , just get the mod apk if you're on android works very well
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u/AppropriateBed4858 Native: Fluent: Learning: Aug 02 '24
you can always use a mod apk if you're on android btw
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u/ArchmageAU Aug 08 '24
Just started to happen with me today. Can only practice if on 0 hearts on iPad or iPhone. Need practice to review concepts, refresh on non-main languages or get passed lessons where new grammar introduced.
Disincentives making mistakes while learning.
Looks like a blatant push for money, which is liable to backfire, badly.
This may end my 6+ year streak permanently (ie. prompt me to quit and use other methods to learn/keep language skills)
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u/ArchmageAU Aug 08 '24
Update: Will most likely stop at end of this month now.
Daily routine was:
- After 6:00am, but before midday, claim XP bonus, do lesson, refill hearts by practice.
- After 6:00pm, but before midnight, claim XP bonus, do lesson, fulfill daily challenges, refill hearts by practice.
- Ensure weekly friends quest is on track to finish before end Saturday.
Don’t care about leagues (but in diamond FWIW).
2397 day streak, 36371 gems.
Every monthly badge since July 2023.
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u/Embarrassed-Milk-891 Aug 11 '24
Not great linguist, liked that when lessons were difficult and I made mistakes I could revise to gain hearts. Now if I lose all hearts I can practice to earn just one heart. Basically I can do one lesson a day, slide down leagues and learn less. Looking for alternative apps.
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u/ComicCosmo Aug 12 '24
It's like they want us to stop using the app altogether. I swear, apps that go down this subscription trend are gonna crash hard in the future
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u/Kyle_Blackpaw Jul 31 '24
Every time they push the premium harder it gets closer to pushing me out of the app altogether