Home / Best apps to learn a language / Indonesian
Prices and language coverage checked in October 2026.
Indonesian has about 252 million speakers, 75 million of them native, by Ethnologue’s count as cited by Wikipedia. It is the national language of a country of 288 million people by a 2025 estimate, where 700+ regional languages are spoken: only 19.94% of Indonesians over 5 spoke it mainly at home at the 2010 census, and over 97% were fluent in it at the 2020 census. What Indonesian asks of an app is the affixes, the gap between formal and colloquial speech, a clear answer on Malay, and audio, since one letter, e, stands for two vowels.
The big apps give Indonesian little. Duolingo’s course is A1 by its own labels, Babbel stops at A2 by its help centre and Pimsleur sells one level, while Busuu, Rosetta Stone, Speak, Language Transfer, Lingopie and FluentU have no Indonesian course at all. The depth sits with specialists and the government: Indonesian Online, written by two academics, and the Badan Bahasa’s free BIPA textbooks. So the apps below are compared on where they stop, which register they teach, what is free on day 30 and who corrects your speech.
The US Foreign Service Institute puts Indonesian in category II (of I to IV), about 900 class hours for an English speaker to reach professional working proficiency.
Indonesian is a standardised form of Malay, and the two are generally mutually intelligible, but in a 1998 test by the linguist Asmah Haji Omar, Malaysian students reading Indonesian newspapers found 30% of the items odd or unintelligible. Spelling and loanwords differ (kualitas against kualiti, universitas against universiti), and some words change meaning: baja is steel in Indonesian and fertiliser in Malaysia. Every app in this guide teaches Indonesian, and none of the big ones teaches Malay to English speakers. Learn Indonesian unless Malaysia or Brunei is where you will live.
Courses, news and official writing use formal Indonesian; YouTube, chat and TV dramas use colloquial Jakarta Indonesian, where tidak becomes nggak, sangat becomes banget, gue (from Hokkien) and lu serve as I and you among close friends, and the suffixes -kan and -i often become -in (mencarikan, nyariin). Duolingo, Babbel, Pimsleur, Memrise and the BIPA textbooks teach the standard register; Indonesian Online teaches both and marks colloquial words. Learn the formal base from a course, and pick up the colloquial forms from tutors, YouTube and Netflix.
Indonesian verbs do not change for person, number or tense: time comes from words such as sudah (already) and belum (not yet), there is no grammatical gender, and doubling a noun marks a plural, which is optional when the number is clear. The work is the affixes: me(N)-, ber-, di-, ter-, pe(N)-, -kan, -i and -an turn one root into a family of words, and di- puts the focus on the one acted on, meng- on the one acting. Duolingo has units on ber-, me-, di- and -kan. Learn every new verb with its root and its prefix.
Duolingo’s Indonesian is A1 by its own section labels, and Indonesian was not among the 9 courses Duolingo took to B2 in April 2026. Babbel stops at A2 by its help centre, Pimsleur sells one level of 30 lessons, Memrise labels its course “All levels” with no CEFR mapping and Mango’s Indonesian page names no level. Indonesian Online runs to C1/C2 by its own labels, and the BIPA textbooks cover all 7 BIPA levels. Plan on Indonesian Online, the BIPA books or a tutor from A2.
The UKBI, the Badan Bahasa’s proficiency test, is taken online from home, Monday to Thursday, with a camera and a headset, and scored from 251 to 800 in 7 bands, Terbatas to Istimewa. Foreign adults pay about US$56 (Rp1,000,000) and university students about US$28 (Rp500,000), through an Indonesian billing code within 24 hours; the digital certificate is valid for 2 years. A work permit puts the language training on the employer, and naturalisation asks that you speak Indonesian but names no score. Book the UKBI when a university or employer asks for it.
Best free daily course
The Indonesian course from English is 69 units and 1,189 lessons in an Intro section and two A1 sections, by Duolingo’s own labels, per an unofficial tracker, with no Stories and no Video Call. It teaches the first affixes, ber-, me-, di- and -kan, and builds a daily habit, then stops at A1.
Good
Where it stops
Best for: A free daily Indonesian habit from zero to A1; on a laptop, without the Energy cap.
Best online course to C1
Written by two academics, Uli Kozok and George Quinn, its 7 courses run from A1 to C1/C2 by their own labels; the core, The Indonesian Way, is 113 lessons and about 300 hours from A1 to B1. It teaches formal and colloquial Indonesian side by side. It is the deepest Indonesian course we found.
Good
Where it stops
Best for: A1 to C1 learners who want a full syllabus in both registers, written by two academics, at a low price.
Best podcast course
Innovative Language’s Indonesian course runs from Absolute Beginner to Advanced by its own labels, with no CEFR mapping, in audio and video lessons; its YouTube channel has 4.13 million subscribers and a new video on 1 October 2026. The free account keeps Survival Phrases and new weekly lessons, and the low prices need a 24 month plan.
Good
Where it stops
Best for: Beginners who want audio and video lessons in order, free to start and cheap on a long plan.
Best live tutors
Preply lists 522 Indonesian tutors, and tutors from Indonesia average US$10 an hour on its Indonesian page. Below B1, pick a trained teacher who can explain the affixes in your language; from B1 on, a weekly lesson gives you colloquial Jakarta Indonesian and a person who hears your Indonesian and corrects it.
Good
Where it stops
Best for: Anyone from A1 who needs a person to talk to, and to teach the Jakarta Indonesian of everyday speech.
Best free official course
Indonesia’s language agency, the Badan Bahasa, publishes Sahabatku Indonesia, textbooks for the 7 BIPA levels set by a 2017 ministry regulation, 10 units each with audio, and 386 readers labelled by BIPA level, free to download. It is the government’s own syllabus, in books rather than an app.
Good
Where it stops
Best for: Self-learners from zero who want a free syllabus with audio from the agency that runs the UKBI.
Best for phrases with native video
Memrise has an official Indonesian course, one of its 23, with 500+ lessons, 4,000+ words, 200+ videos of native speakers and 75+ AI conversations, per its Indonesian page, which labels it “All levels” with no CEFR mapping. It teaches phrases, not grammar, so pair it with a course.
Good
Where it stops
Best for: The first few hundred Indonesian phrases with real voices, at the yearly price.
Best free course with a library card
Mango’s Indonesian page mentions Jakarta and Lombok but gives no lesson count and no level, so we cannot say how far the course goes. Many US public libraries give it free with a library card, which makes it a second free course beside Duolingo.
Good
Where it stops
Best for: Beginners with a US library card who want a guided start at no cost.
Best for reading real books
Lingo7 puts a translation in your own language under every sentence of an Indonesian book (49 languages), reads it aloud and drills saved words in 12 kinds of exercise. It has no Indonesian shelf, so you read its Stories, then the classics you import, free as EPUB from Indonesian Wikisource. It is our app, and it has no course.
Good
Where it stops
Best for: A2 learners reading the Stories, and B1 and up readers who import a bought EPUB or the Balai Pustaka classics from Indonesian Wikisource and want their own language under the text.
Best for speaking from lesson one
Pimsleur’s Indonesian is one level of 30 audio lessons, about 16 hours, in “standard Indonesian as spoken in Jakarta”, per its page: you answer out loud, and words come back at spaced intervals. Pimsleur publishes no CEFR level and sells no Level 2. A month of Indonesian Premium covers the 30 lessons at one a day.
Good
Where it stops
Best for: A trip in a month, a commute, or anyone who wants to say their first Indonesian sentences out loud before they read.
Best sentence drill
Fill the blank in real Indonesian sentences, in a Fast Track of 10 levels or in frequency collections that run to 50,000 words. Nothing is explained, so it works beside a course from A2, and the free 30 sentences a day are enough for that.
Good
Where it stops
Best for: Ten minutes a day from A2 on top of a course, with the affixes in real sentences.
Best for video input
Indonesian subtitles and a translation into your language side by side on YouTube, with a dictionary on click, free for subtitles and lookups. It turns Indonesian YouTube and Netflix’s Indonesian series, such as Cigarette Girl (2023) and Joko Anwar’s Nightmares and Daydreams (2024), into listening practice. The Netflix side broke in June 2026 and in September works with known bugs.
Good
Where it stops
Best for: B1 and up with a laptop, turning Indonesian YouTube and Netflix into listening practice.
Duolingo + BIPA Daring + IndonesianPod101
Pick one course and do it every day: Duolingo for the free habit and the first affixes, or Indonesian Online’s The Indonesian Way for a syllabus to B1 at US$9 a month. Beside it, work through the free BIPA 1 textbook with its audio and IndonesianPod101’s Survival Phrases. Pimsleur is the paid choice if you want to speak before you read; with a US library card, Mango Languages is free.
Indonesian Online + Preply + Clozemaster
Keep a course going to B1: Duolingo stops at A1 by its own labels, so move on to The Indonesian Way or the BIPA 2 and 3 textbooks. Book a Preply tutor once a week for speaking and the colloquial forms, and drill Clozemaster’s Fast Track for 10 minutes a day. Start reading with Lingo7’s Stories at A2, then BIPA readers or bought ebooks you import, since it has no Indonesian shelf.
Lingo7 + Language Reactor + Preply
Courses thin out here. Read Azab dan Sengsara or Sitti Nurbaya in Lingo7 from free Indonesian Wikisource EPUBs, or your own copy of Laskar Pelangi, watch Cigarette Girl or Indonesian YouTube with Language Reactor, and talk about all of it with your tutor. With a UKBI date, take the free official practice tests and book a tutor who knows the exam.
| App | Role | Levels | Coverage for Indonesian | Free | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Duolingo | Best free daily course | A0 to A1 | Indonesian only, no Malay course for English speakers; A1 by Duolingo’s section labels; 69 units, 1,189 lessons and 1,972 words by an unofficial tracker, no Stories | Every lesson; Energy cap on a phone | US$13 to 17 a month, US$7 to 10 a month yearly |
| Indonesian Online | Best online course to C1 | A1 to C1 | Formal and colloquial Indonesian, colloquial words marked; A1 to C1/C2 by its labels across 7 courses; The Indonesian Way: 113 lessons, about 300 hours, A1 to B1 | Sample lessons | US$9 a month, or US$90 for 2 years |
| IndonesianPod101 | Best podcast course | A0 to B1 | Absolute Beginner to Advanced by the vendor’s labels, no CEFR mapping; a 50+ lesson Survival Phrases course; a YouTube channel of 4.13 million subscribers | Survival Phrases and weekly lessons | US$2 to 13 a month on a 24 month plan |
| Preply | Best live tutors | A1 to C2 | 522 Indonesian tutors; tutors from Indonesia average US$10 an hour, from Malaysia US$25 | None | Tutors from Indonesia US$10 an hour, subscription only |
| BIPA Daring | Best free official course | A0 to B2 | Standard Indonesian; 7 levels, BIPA 1 to 7, by a 2017 ministry regulation; Sahabatku Indonesia textbooks, 10 units each with audio; 386 readers by BIPA level | All of it | Free |
| Memrise | Best for phrases with native video | A0 to A2 | Official Indonesian course; 500+ lessons, 4,000+ words, 200+ native speaker videos, 75+ AI conversations; “All levels”, no CEFR mapping | Limited, with ads | US$25 a month, US$5 a month yearly |
| Mango Languages | Best free course with a library card | A0 to A2 | No lesson count or level stated; Jakarta and Lombok named on its Indonesian page | Free through many US libraries | Free via many libraries; US$10 a month yearly |
| Lingo7 | Best for reading real books | A2 to C1 | No Indonesian public domain shelf; Stories in two versions, adapted for A1 to A2 and original for B1 to B2; your own books in 7 formats (EPUB, PDF, FB2, DOCX, TXT, Markdown, HTML); native audio in an Indonesia accent, one voice; translation into 49 languages | First page of each book | US$5 a month, US$2.50 a month yearly |
| Pimsleur | Best for speaking from lesson one | A0 to A1 | Standard Indonesian as spoken in Jakarta; Level 1 only: 30 lessons, about 16 hours; no vendor CEFR claim | 7 day trial | About US$20 a month, or US$150 once |
| Clozemaster | Best sentence drill | A2 to C1 | Indonesian from English; a Fast Track in 10 levels; frequency collections up to 50,000 words | 30 sentences a day | US$13 a month, US$7 a month yearly |
| Language Reactor | Best for video input | B1 to C2 | Any Indonesian YouTube video with subtitles; Netflix series such as Cigarette Girl, working with known bugs in September 2026 | Most of it | US$6 a month, US$3.33 a month yearly |
Prices are US store or vendor prices as of October 2026, yearly plans shown as the monthly equivalent. The same app often costs less on its own site than in the App Store, and more in Europe than in the US.
Free on this site: short Indonesian texts at A1, A2 and B1 with a translation.
We have no affiliate deals with any app named here, and none of the links pay us. Prices and coverage come from the vendor’s own help or pricing pages or its US store listing, checked in October 2026, and every other figure names its source in the text; the judgement calls lean on independent reviews, and on the one star reviews for the parts a landing page never shows, like what happens on renewal. Where a vendor’s pages contradict each other, the card says so.
Refund rules, the traps to avoid and the same apps compared by level for every language are on the best apps to learn a language page.
For a start, yes, and it is free: Indonesian from English is 69 units and 1,189 lessons in an Intro section and two A1 sections, by an unofficial tracker reading Duolingo’s data. On its own it is not enough: it stops at A1 with 1,972 words, has no Stories and no Video Call for Indonesian, Indonesian was not among the 9 courses Duolingo took to B2 in April 2026, and on a phone Energy stops free study after about 2 to 3 lessons a day, by a third-party count (the web version runs on hearts). Add Indonesian Online or the free BIPA textbooks, IndonesianPod101 for listening and a tutor once you can put a few sentences together.
Indonesian, unless you will live in Malaysia or Brunei. The two are generally mutually intelligible, but in a 1998 test by the linguist Asmah Haji Omar, Malaysian students found 30% of the items in Indonesian newspapers odd or unintelligible, and the colloquial varieties differ more: Indonesian TV dramas are subtitled in Malaysia. Indonesian has about 252 million speakers by Ethnologue’s count, and 1.2% of websites are in Indonesian against under 0.1% in Malay, per W3Techs. Every app in this guide teaches Indonesian; Duolingo and LingQ have no Malay course for English speakers, and Memrise no official one. In Lingo7, Indonesian and Malaysian Malay are separate languages.
Yes: the UKBI of the Badan Bahasa, taken online from home with a camera, headset and microphone, Monday to Thursday. Package 1 tests listening, language rules and reading, package 2 adds writing and package 3 speaking; scores run from 251 to 800 in 7 bands, Terbatas to Istimewa. Foreign adults pay about US$56 (Rp1,000,000), university students about US$28 (Rp500,000), and the digital certificate is valid for 2 years. A work permit puts language training on the employer, and naturalisation asks that you speak Indonesian, with no UKBI score named. The free practice tests are on simulasiukbi.kemendikdasmen.go.id.
Reading suits Indonesian early, because the verbs do not change for person or tense and the alphabet is Latin, but the page does not show which e is a schwa, so read with audio. Lingo7, our app, puts a translation under each sentence of an Indonesian book, reads it aloud in an Indonesia accent and drills the words you save in 12 kinds of exercise, for US$5 a month or US$30 a year. It has no Indonesian shelf, so begin with its Stories, then import the classics free as EPUB from Indonesian Wikisource, such as Azab dan Sengsara or Sitti Nurbaya; Project Gutenberg has no Indonesian books. Modern favourites such as Laskar Pelangi are bought.
For a course, Duolingo, with every lesson free and Energy capping study on a phone, to A1 by its own labels, and the Badan Bahasa’s BIPA Daring, whose Sahabatku Indonesia textbooks cover 7 levels with audio; with a US library card, Mango. For listening, IndonesianPod101’s free account and the Bahasa Indonesia Bersama Windah podcast. For drills, Clozemaster’s 30 free sentences a day; for words, the official KBBI dictionary and SEAlang. For a tutor you pay: Preply on a subscription, or italki with none, with trial lessons from US$5.
Formal, almost all of them. Duolingo, Babbel, Pimsleur (“standard Indonesian as spoken in Jakarta”), Memrise and the BIPA textbooks teach the standard register of the news, of official writing and of the UKBI. Indonesian Online teaches both, marks colloquial words and advises starting with “relaxed formal Indonesian”. The colloquial Jakarta forms, such as nggak for tidak, banget for sangat, gimana for bagaimana, bikin for membuat and -in for -kan, come from tutors, YouTube and Netflix with Language Reactor. Learn the formal register first: it is understood across Indonesia.
Not by the FSI’s ranking, though the grammar is easy by English standards: verbs do not change for person or tense, there is no gender, and the alphabet is Latin. The FSI puts Indonesian in its Category II with German and Malay, a step above Spanish and French; the work is in the affixes, the gap between formal and colloquial speech and the core words with no English cognate, though loans such as informasi, universitas and polisi help. Watch the false friends: air is water, kaki a foot or leg and mobil a car.
Read your first page free, in Indonesian.