Ouino Review: Spanish Lessons

Ouino Spanish (pronounced "We Know Spanish" - pretty creative, right?) has a unique teaching approach, as it's student led. You decide the order of your lessons. Maybe relatives will visit soon and you want to brush up on family vocabulary. Or you have an important meeting and want to improve your grammar ability. The choice is yours. When you realize that learning a language doesn't have to be linear, and you don't have to use only the present tense for a whole year before you utter anything about yesterday or any other past event, like you might in a classroom or other linear program, you'll understand the Ouino method.

The monthly plans offer limited access

When you pay with a monthly subscription for Ouino's Spanish lessons, you have a 30-day satisfaction guarantee and you won't have any ads to interrupt your progress. You get access to more than 450 lessons and 1,300 exercises, and you can use multiple devices.

The lifetime subscription offers more

When you buy Ouino's lifetime subscription, you'll get personal Spanish language mentoring and you'll be able to access any upgrades when they're available. But wait, there's more. If you purchase Lifetime for one language, you'll get the 2nd language for 50% if you put it in your cart. Or you can get all languages for $191.52.

Learn by phrase, not by grammatical tense

Think about it. When you learned your first language, your parents didn't only talk to you in the present tense until you were one year old and then only used the past tense for another year; no, that would be silly. Same with the Ouino approach. When you get the free trial, you'll hear a Spanish dialog about having a friend over. The conversation will have verbs in various tenses at once, and Ouino uses these as just another phrase to learn. They don't scare you and make learning Spanish difficult. By incorporating various tenses into one conversation in a subtle manner, the Spanish dialog feels natural and not forced, and it's easier to learn.

Have fun and learn what you want

Because the lessons' grammar placement doesn't go in any specific order, choose a topic or theme that you like and start with that unit. Let loose and learn what you want, when you want. What if the grammar is complicated? Ouino calls this Building Blocks and explains them as they occur.

What if hopping from topic to topic makes you feel uneasy?

Don't worry: if you don't want to hop around, Ouino has a "recommended path" for your Spanish lessons and curriculum, and you can take that recommended path whenever you want for as long as you want.

Fun fact about Ouino and gendered words

Sometimes we just can't remember that it's el papel (paper) and la flor (flower). Ouino will have a male saying the masculine Spanish words and a female saying the feminine Spanish words so it's less taxing on the brain.

Fluency is fun

Ouino's goal isn't that you memorize Spanish words, take vocabulary and grammar quizzes, and fill in conjugation charts. Language is communication and we all want to speak it and be fluent. So Ouino gives you Spanish readings and videos to build your skills. If you get the Lifetime subscription, you can talk with native speakers. Put together your listening, speaking, reading, and writing skills, and that's what fluency is all about.

Prizes are fun, too

Sometimes we need a little external motivation to want to get to the next lesson. Ouino tracks your progress, letting you know which Spanish lessons you did well on and which you might want to review down the road. And when you do well on a Spanish exercise by getting 70% or above, you get a prize. Depending on your score, you'll get a bronze, silver, or gold fluency medal. The medals are displayed on the lesson and also on your Ouino calendar. You can also see your progress on your calendar, so if you skip too many days, it's right there for you to see that and get you back on track.

You judge your own speaking

Oh, Ouino, you need to upgrade your technology. Ouino's outdated technology lets you record your voice, but you need to judge yourself and determine if your Spanish would be understood or not. This is a tall task for a learner, and that type of old technology has been around since the 1970s or before. There are, however, a couple of other highly-recommended Spanish language platforms we recommend that recognize what you've said in Spanish and give you appropriate feedback.

Even if you choose your own path, Ouino can be repetitive

Repetition and potential for boredom can be a common setback for online language-learning programs. Ouino has found activities and practice activities that work, and they stick with it, almost to a fault. Unfortunately, this can be boring for the learner and the trophies on the calendar may not be enough to motivate you to get through the next Spanish lesson.

Ouino wins a silver trophy from us

If you're not into the linear method of working through the Spanish-language curriculum and only want to learn what you want to learn, Ouino's for you. Ouino's also great for people who don't want to focus on grammar lessons or focus on conjugations. But silver, Ouino, is all you get from us as you only cater to the one or two types of learners.

Ouino is great, but for the right learner

If you've tried other language-learning formats, whether online, in an app, or in a classroom, and nothing catches your attention because you don't have control over what you learn and when, give Ouino a try. Choose your topic each lesson and pave your own path. However if this isn't motivating enough for you, and you want more bells and whistles, cute animation, interactive dialogs, or speech-recognition technology giving you actual feedback on your speaking and writing, try one of our more highly-rated Spanish-language lesson platforms.

Learn More  ➜

On the Ouino website