Pimsleur and Rosetta Stone are two of the biggest names in the language learning industry. So which one is actually worth your money? In this comparison, we highlight the pros and cons of each program so you can figure out which one is the better match for your learning style.
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The old-school, tried and true language learning formula. With lots of images, it’s the perfect app for visual learners and anyone who wants to learn by immersion. |
Video: Pimsleur Or Rosetta Stone?
In the video above, Bianca from the Guide2Fluency team compares the language learning apps from Rosetta Stone and Pimsleur.
Editor’s Choice
Pimsleur
- 51+ Languages
- Money Back Guarantee
Pros
- Highly effective learning framework based on the Pimsleur Method
- Interactive audio lessons improve listening and verbal skills
- Voice Coach AI tool provides pronunciation feedback
- Top-notch digital platform and mobile app
- Driving mode for learning on the go
Cons
- Lessons are somewhat long
- Slightly more expensive than Rosetta Stone
How The Pimsleur & Rosetta Stone Programs Work
Before getting into the strengths and weaknesses of each program, let’s start with a quick overview of each app.
How Rosetta Stone Works
Each lesson in the Rosetta Stone program covers core aspects of language learning like pronunciation, grammar, reading, vocab, writing, and listening. Drills usually take around 5-10 minutes each and move pretty fast.
Rosetta Stone is largely built around images. Almost every single exercise in the course involves pictures in one way or another.
Sometimes, you listen to an audio clip and match what was said to the right picture. At other times, the program will have you match written phrases to the images. You might also say out loud what you see in an image or even learn grammar through pictures.
In short, Rosetta Stone mainly uses pictures to teach the language you’re learning.
The program is clearly designed to help you create mental associations between what you’re learning and imagery. This forces you to rely more on intuition rather than memorization as you learn new words and phrases.
How Pimsleur Works
Let’s say you aren’t much of a visual learner. Whereas Rosetta Stone is an image-based program, Pimsleur places more focus on audio lessons and conversational practice.
To start each Pimsleur lesson, you complete a 30-minute audio exercise where a moderator speaking in English walks you through a guided conversation step-by-step.
You’ll listen to a few sentences in your target language before the moderator briefly stops to explain the situation to you. After that, you actually participate in the conversation by answering questions and repeating phrases.
This 30-minute audio exercise is the backbone of each Pimsleur lesson, and frankly, it’s what Pimsleur is known for.
After you complete each audio lesson, you then review what you just learned through a variety of drills. It’s kind of like class followed by homework.
These reinforcement drills include reading exercises, digital flashcards, quizzes, pronunciation training, and speed games. Not to mention, Pimsleur does have some supplemental features too, such as vocabulary bonus packs and direct speaking exercises with Voice Coach, their AI-powered voice software.
That’s Pimsleur in a nutshell. You’ve got core audio lessons followed by detailed review exercises, with a few bonus tools wrapped around it.
The key takeaway: these two programs take very different approaches. Both offer really serious lessons with solid material, but the method is totally different.
Pimsleur uses audio exercises and conversational practice to teach, while Rosetta Stone relies almost exclusively on imagery and immersion.
Cost Comparison
Next, let’s talk pricing. Rosetta Stone has two plans to choose from. The 12-month plan costs about $10 per month. Your other option is the lifetime plan, which is a one-time purchase and gets you access for life to all of Rosetta Stone’s 25 languages. That retails for $300 (sometimes found for about $100 after discounts).
Pimsleur offers the Pimsleur Premium Plan, which costs about $20 per month. Then there’s the Pimsleur All Access Plan, which gets you access to all 51 of Pimsleur’s languages. That plan costs just one dollar more per month (i.e., $21 per month).
Putting that in perspective, Rosetta Stone is cheaper than Pimsleur by around $10 per month. Though I would just note that both Pimsleur and Rosetta are pretty good about running discounts, so make sure to check for coupon codes before buying.
Why Pimsleur Is Better Than Rosetta Stone
Next, let me break down the ways in which each app is superior to the other. We’ll start with Pimsleur.
Focus On Speaking & Listening
When you think about learning a language, you probably picture yourself casually chatting with a native speaker, right? Unlike Rosetta Stone, Pimsleur focuses primarily on listening comprehension and speaking practice. They’re actually built to help you understand the language and feel comfortable engaging in conversation. Rosetta Stone isn’t.
One of the fastest ways to learn a language is through frequent, heavy doses of speaking and listening practice.
Rosetta Stone has some on-demand videos and short exercises that require you to speak, but it’s not the same as the conversational depth that Pimsleur offers.
The Pimsleur audio exercises are great at building your listening and speaking skills, and you’ll develop an ear for the language much more quickly by listening to their audio recordings every day.
Voice Coach Tool
Since Pimsleur is engineered to get you talking naturally, not just listening, they’ve also incorporated better speech software.
Rosetta Stone does include some brief speaking exercises. Their speech software, called TruAccent, gives you pronunciation feedback, so it’s not like you’re only doing visual work.
However, I prefer Pimsleur’s voice recognition software tool. The Pimsleur program listens to you say words and phrases, then gives you feedback on your pronunciation on a star system basis. You’re getting pretty accurate feedback and a smooth experience without too many glitches or mistakes.
That’s actually my biggest issue with Rosetta Stone’s TruAccent technology; it’s just so over-sensitive. At times, when I knew I was saying a word correctly, Rosetta Stone would make me repeat it over and over — sometimes 3 or 4 times in a row.
This became somewhat annoying, whereas I never seemed to have that problem with Pimsleur’s software. Plus, one feature that I especially like about Pimsleur’s tech is “challenge mode.”
When you turn this feature on, you’ll be prompted in English to say a phrase in your target language with no hint as to how to say it. This makes you think critically about what to say, and you still need to nail your pronunciation. It’s a difficult exercise, but a very helpful one.
More Flexibility
If you’re a busy professional or parent with a lot on your plate, you’ll value Pimsleur’s flexibility. Because the Pimsleur audio lessons are audio-based, you don’t have to be staring at a screen, matching pictures to phrases all day. With Pimsleur, you can hit play and go about whatever you’re doing.
You can do a lesson while you’re taking a walk, cleaning the house, re-organizing your closet, etc. In essence, you can still be productive with your time while making language progress. It’s a big bonus.
In fact, you can even do an audio lesson while driving because they have a special driving mode. This is honestly one of their best selling points in my opinion. Pimsleur actually fits into your life without taking up too much extra time. If busyness is one of the main reasons you’ve been struggling to make progress with your language learning goals, Pimsleur might be the solution you need.
👉 Read Our Full Pimsleur Spanish Review
Rosetta Stone
- 25+ Languages
- Money Back Guarantee
Pros
- Learning framework built around immersion (makes you think critically)
- Emphasis on visuals and imagery (great for visual learners)
- Lots of nice supplemental learning tools, like on demand videos
- Very clean and easy to use interface
- Subscription plans are more affordable
Cons
- Lessons can become repetitive (all picture-based)
- Wish there was more in-depth verbal practice
Why Rosetta Stone Is Better Than Pimsleur
Now, let’s shift gears and talk about Rosetta’s advantages over Pimsleur.
Imagery For Visual Learners
Here’s the number one area where I see Rosetta Stone beating Pimsleur: all of the visuals in the program really help you quickly memorize new words.
Some people are just pure visual learners. They mentally associate the new things they learn with pictures and graphics, so when they hear that word again, the image comes straight to mind.
In this way, you learn the language directly, without using English as a go-between. You directly associate the word you’re learning with the actual meaning or concept behind it – not another English word.
If you’re one of these people that learns visually and retains content best by making mental associations between new words and images, Rosetta Stone is great. They have a picture for absolutely everything, making it easy for new information to stick.
Focus On Immersion
You’ve probably heard that immersion is the best way to learn a language. That’s why the Rosetta Stone framework barely uses any English.
They don’t directly tell you what to do in English or translate words and sentences for you.
This all goes back to the point I noted above about learning intuitively. Rosetta Stone wants you to be immersed in the new language for the period of time that you’re sitting there working exercises. They want you to struggle a little bit; it’s part of the process.
Now, to be fair, they do occasionally give you translations. Most of the time, however, this is a hidden feature you can turn on just now and then, when you’re really stuck. Otherwise, you’re figuring everything out yourself.
While this sounds hard, the reality is that the fastest way to learn a language is being immersed in the culture and hearing the language day in and day out, and Rosetta Stone tries to give you a brief opportunity to do that every day.
To some people, this can be a little frustrating and discouraging because you will get stuck at times. But if you don’t mind struggling at certain parts, you’ll learn a lot faster than you would from a program that spoon-feeds you everything.
Extra Learning Tools
The final highlight for Rosetta Stone is all of the cool, extra resources they provide. When it comes to extra resources, Pimsleur doesn’t provide much. There are no leaderboards, videos, podcasts, or games.
Rosetta Stone, on the other hand, offers more supplemental tools than almost every other language learning app.
They give you phrasebooks, short on-demand video lessons, stories, audio companion lessons, and even some live lessons. Rosetta Stone has an incredibly comprehensive suite of tools for you to use outside of the main coursework.
If you’re a serious learner who wants to do some extra credit outside of your daily lessons, Rosetta Stone will give you more opportunity than Pimsleur (and almost every other language learning company).
Verdict: Which Language App Is Better?
So which is the better program: Rosetta Stone or Pimsleur? Honestly, these are two of the strongest options on the market. Either way, you’re not going to make a bad decision. But if I had to choose one, I prefer Pimsleur. If you want to actually engage in conversation and not feel totally lost, Pimsleur is one of the best tools available for learning real-world speaking and listening.
Rosetta Stone still has its place, especially for visual learners. They also throw in a lot of extras that keep the learning process fun.
But Pimsleur has created the more well-rounded program by combining interactive audio lessons with thorough reinforcement drills. The Voice Coach speech software gives you an accurate idea of where you need to improve, and the material always kept me engaged. If you want to use your new language in day-to-day conversations, go with Pimsleur.
The biggest difference between Pimsleur and Rosetta Stone is which learning style they use. The Pimsleur program is centered around interactive audio lessons with fluent speakers, while the Rosetta Stone lessons revolve around imagery and language immersion. In other words, Rosetta Stone is very image heavy and Pimsleur is very audio heavy.
Which program is better somewhat depends on your style of learning. If you’re a visual learner, Rosetta Stone will likely be a better fit with its image-heavy lessons. However, if you’re more of an auditory learner, Pimsleur’s audio lessons are very hard to beat. We give Pimsleur a slightly better overall grade.
No, the typical Pimsleur subscription costs about $8 more per month than Rosetta Stone on average.
Free trial availability varies by plan and region, and it changes over time. Check each provider’s current offer page before you sign up so you know exactly what you are getting.
