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Preply Pros And Cons: My Experience Learning Spanish

Last Updated on January 16, 2025 by Kieran Beckles

Are you looking to learn a new language, but you don’t like the idea of using a language-learning app?

I’ve been attempting to learn Spanish to be able to speak to my wife’s Mexican family over the past three years.

The birth of my daughter and the desire to speak Spanish to her and my wife’s extended family gave me the push to sign up to lessons.

However, I found language apps such as Babbel and Rosetta Stone could only take me so far. So, I signed up for Preply.

In this article, I’m going to share my pros and cons of Preply based on my experience of using their platform for almost two years.

Preply Pros

Excellent teachers
Preply (Photo: Preply / Screen grab)

I was a little nervous before I booked my first lesson. I found the idea of video lessons slightly overwhelming. It brought me back to my Irish and French oral exams in Irish secondary school. However, I found a great teacher who spoke English fluently with a lot of experience when it came to teaching Spanish. You can read the reviews and ratings of the tutors before selecting one that takes your fancy. You can also change your tutor without much hassle if you do decide to try a few different teachers before settling on one.

Discounted first lesson

You can get a discounted price for your first lessons which reduces the risk with selecting a tutor to meet your needs. I was able to speak to my tutor about my ability to speak Spanish and my long-term goals as well as giving my tutor an idea of my level through conversation. As I mentioned above, you don’t need to commit to your teacher long-term. I would recommend testing out a few teachers before making a decision.

Lessons catered to the student

You can tell the teacher how you’d like to learn your desired language when using Preply and other platforms that provide video lessons. I wanted to improve my ability to converse in Spanish with my wife’s Mexican family. It was also important to me that I was able to listen and understand spoken Spanish. I wasn’t occupied with learning to read and write in Spanish. Those weren’t priorities.

Vocabulary builder

Preply offers a vocabulary builder, which allows students to do some work in between lessons. If you don’t have a membership to a language-learning app, this feature could be useful should you want to continue working on your language skills before your next class.

Different packages

I had limited time to schedule lessons as a busy parent and a business owner. Preply offers the ability to select a schedule that works for you whether it’s one class a week, two classes per week or even more if you’ve got the time.

Preply Cons

No free trial
Preply (Photo: Preply / Screen grab)

Preply doesn’t offer a free trial to new students. I’d love to see this feature to give students a chance to test the waters before signing up for video classes. Naturally, some students may find one-to-one classes with teachers to be outside their comfort zone. According to Reddit, Preply tutors don’t get paid for your first lesson, and the platform keeps your payment. This is a shame. It would be great to ensure the tutors get the fee for your first class or Preply cover the cost.

Awkward subscription model

Prepy requires students to schedule their classes each month. For instance, if you pay for four classes, you need to schedule those four classes within that month. If you don’t, you’ll lose the class credit (more on that in my next point). I like how Preply’s competitor, iTalki, allows students to pay for a package and schedule the lessons at their convenience.

Forfeited credits

If you don’t schedule all your lessons within the billing period, you lose the credit. If you have to cancel a class, you need to reschedule within the period, or you lose the credit. I didn’t like the inflexibility of Preply. As a parent and a business owner, I had to cancel last minute a few times and I lost my credits if I was unable to reschedule.

Preply takes big cut (from tutors)

This con doesn’t affect the students, but it does impact the tutors. If, like me, you grow to become friends with your tutor, you want them to get fair value. However, Preply does seem to take a bigger cut from the tutors compared to other platforms such as iTalki (this is according to my research on Reddit).

Wrapping Up

Preply (Photo: Preply / Screen grab)

So there we have it! I’ve reached the end of my pros and cons article based on my experience using Preply.

I had a great experience with Preply thanks to the excellent tutor I found on the language platform. It really propelled my Spanish forward.

If you’re looking to learn a new language or continue to improve your language skills, I believe Preply could be a good option.

There are some cons to their service that I’d like to see ironed out, but Preply did help me to improve my Spanish and become much more confident.

Preply Pros And Cons

We share our pros and cons of using Preply based on my experience learning Spanish with a tutor through the platform.

Pros

  • Excellent teachers
  • Discounted first lesson
  • Lessons catered to the student
  • Vocabulary builder
  • Different packages

Cons

  • No free trial
  • Awkward subscription model
  • Forfeited credits
  • Preply takes big cut (from tutors)
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