I switched from Duolingo to Busuu for my Japanese learning and it’s so much better. They did add leagues to it too but you can just ignore it.
The gamification is less than Duolingo. When I complete a review it praises me for my keeping up my streak, and they also added achievements. However there aren't gems, premium upsell ads (it's a paid app), etc.
The trick for Duolingo is to use the desktop version and disable all the "helpful" bits you can or at least use the browser version if on mobile. Desktop had far fewer gamified bits than the app as of a year ago (the new UI broke my workflow and I dropped it). Gems weren't a meaningful thing, etc.
In particular: Use your keyboard for everything. You'll probably want to be able to type in the target language anyway and it helps you avoid the trap of being really good at pattern recognition instead of really learning all the grammar quirks.
You can disable both animations and the leaderboard gamification in the settings (the latter by setting your profile to private). CSS/uBlock can help hide other distractions, add dark mode, etc. as needed.
It takes a bit of intentional work to unbury the learning tool beneath but Duolingo itself, especially if you have a general idea of how to go about learning a language, is still really useful.
Super helpful link that I used along the way as well (not mine): https://runwes.com/2020/02/11/howilearnedfrench.html
ask it for a 12-week curriculum and have it go through it with you
It can do languages and you can get google to pronounce things, and ChatGPT again to explain unexpected nuances
when multimodal is rolled out to your profile, you can practice handwriting too
—Arthur —dijo con tono cortante, ["Arthur," he said sharply.] y su voz sonó como el chasquido de una ratonera—, [and his voice sounded like the click of a mousetrap.]
There is zero gamification, as it's not needed - you're motivated by the pleasure of reading.
It won't help you to learn to speak (there is an option to read aloud a selected phrase though), but it will help you with vocabulary. I went with it from not being able to read even one page, to being able to understand 70% of a book (intermediate Spanish level) in about a month.
ATM looking for beta users, completely free of charge. Pls leave a contact in a comment if you're interested
It's not an app... but rather learning with others.
Advanced-level language learners may want to transition into actual real live conversations-- it's so you can spontaneously learn new concepts, expressions, and vocabulary.
I used to use a good penpal-language learning website called MyHappyPlanet. It was back around 2007-2010-ish, and the site no longer exists.
But looks like there are alternatives here:
Specifically, Pablo Román's effort to make this viable for Spanish [1]. I started before there was a website or anything, just watching free youtube videos. Now I'm definitely B2 or C1. I subscribe partially just to show my support even though I mostly consume native-level media now.
Similar and helpful along he lines of CI are [2] and [3].
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Input_hypothesis [1] https://dreamingspanish.com [2] https://refold.la/ [3] https://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/
Much more focused on vocabulary, and learning things that you will use in daily life. And less gamification as well.