German texts by level with translation

Short stories in German for learners, about five minutes of reading each, with a translation under every sentence and audio narrated by native speakers. Every story comes in two versions: adapted for A1-A2 and the original for B1-B2.

Stories in German

300 stories on 6 topics

The adapted version: short sentences and the most common words.

Five minutes of reading each, a translation under every sentence, audio with the current word highlighted.

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Lingo7 app

Read German stories and books with translation

It's more convenient there: every story and book is in one place, and the app remembers where you stopped in each one.

  • Parallel translation A translation under every sentence, and any word explained with one tap.
  • Native audio with shadowing Each word is highlighted as the story is read aloud. Hold a sentence's play button to hear it several times and say it along with the voice.
  • 12 different exercises to learn new words Words you save while reading come back in flashcards, listening, spelling and gap-fill exercises until you know them.

App Store Google Play

★ 4.8 of 5 on the App Store and Google Play

Reviews

What Lingo7 users are saying

Recent reviews from the App Store and Google Play, quoted the way they were written.

  • Pasha Ahsap

    A very useful app for learning a language: you can translate every unfamiliar word with a tap right away and save it.

  • Esteban Velarde

    amazing app very useful Me encantó 🙌🏻☺️

  • Айгуль Оспанова

    great app

  • Great app and really helpful! ⭐️

    Krushelnytska

    I really enjoyed using the app! It’s very helpful, easy to use, and I really liked the way everything is organized. I definitely enjoyed my experience and would recommend it to others. 😊

  • A Rimmer

    I can’t recommend this app enough! I use it to refine my Spanish vocabulary and learn Bulgarian, and I love that you can keep multiple languages and their word lists separate. You can read your own books with instant translation, save new words and use spaced repetition to remember them. The pictures really help words stick, and there are no distracting animations or gimmicky rewards. Easily the best language app I’ve used!

  • Наталка С.

    The best. You can learn words. You can listen to speech with lively intonation. The texts are very interesting. Adapted and original: first I read the adaptation, then switch to the original. You can upload your own book, translate it, and listen and read at the same time.

  • Caspian Sutherland

    Best app I've ever used

  • Viktor

    The app is good, no doubt about it. I recommend it. I did not even expect this. Lots of literature for every taste. Read the simplified version or the original. You build your own dictionary. You take quizzes, very original ones. You can have a conversation on different topics. Super! And not expensive.

  • Mayur Luhadia

    I have already had a yearly subscription for LINGO 7. This app is an excellent resource for anyone looking to improve their English skills. The Hindi translations and detailed explanations provided for each story are incredibly helpful and effective for learners like me.

  • Amazing app! For reading lovers this is an incredible world of different languages. I recommend it! Delighted!

    Ninelle.n

    The app works great! Special thanks for the speed selection! I really liked that you can switch languages. Listen to a book in Russian and read the English translation right there, or listen in English and read the Russian translation.

  • Dmitry Gavrilov

    The idea of the app is great, it's very useful, and I especially love the Library and saving words to the dictionary in a basic form. I would say a big thanks to the developer, who made some fixes and implementations by the mine propositions!

  • Дмитрий Федешов

    I studied French at university and dropped it after graduating. A couple of years later I tried watching a film without subtitles and realised my level had slipped. I started reading in the app bit by bit, simple stories at first. Now I read novels and understand about 80 percent without hints. The audio helped a lot too, my listening got better.

  • Antonino Venticinque

    It is the best.

  • Полина Козлова

    My English was B1 and it felt like I was stuck. Courses were boring, series with subtitles did not help. I started reading books in the app, and in six months my vocabulary roughly tripled. Now I read articles and documentation without translation. The main thing is that you learn not abstract words but the ones that actually come up in texts.

  • 👍🏻

    IPhenomen

    Norwegian is hard to find anywhere. Here there are both texts and audio. I listen to the narration on my way to work and read in the evening. It is handy that you can save words and review them later, they do not get lost.

  • Very convenient for learning

    jeyk_007

    I read in Spanish before bed. The translation is right there, the audio is good. I can feel the progress.

  • shanabbasi

    I've tried several language learning apps, and Lingo7 stands out because of its combination of reading, audio, and flashcards. The parallel reading feature is especially helpful for understanding new words in context. The app is easy to navigate and makes daily practice feel productive rather than boring. A great tool for improving language skills step by step.

  • Nour Abo elmagd

    Georgian! I did not expect to find it. There are texts, the translation works, so does the audio. Thank you.

  • Good parallel reading app

    игра товео

    A very convenient app for parallel reading. I started reading books and articles in the original without constantly translating every word. New words stick much more easily, and in a short time I began to understand spoken English noticeably better. The interface is simple and really motivates you to read every day.

  • Кирилл Шапорев

    I started learning Turkish recently. The texts are interesting, the translation is clear. I like that the audio plays in sync, so you hear right away how to pronounce things.

  • Tatyana Naumova

    The app helped me a lot with learning Serbian

  • Савелий Кулаков

    Great app! I have tried others, but the approach here is more interesting. I have been using it for a little over a week and it really helps. The main thing is to make an effort yourself. There were some unstable moments, but everything was fixed quickly. A huge plus is the very responsive developer.

  • konstantin

    Convenient for German. You read, save words, review them. Everything is simple, nothing extra.

  • Randy S

    Just what I was looking for. Easy books to read to supplement vocabulary learned.

  • Kristina Emad

    Great app, convenient interface and pleasant design. Everything works fast and without problems.

  • Artem Stavilov

    My child reads English fairy tales with the translation and asks for more. Better than any textbook.

  • Ирина Новицкая

    A great app for learning foreign languages.

  • Zeynep Ornek

    I use the audio reading feature in Lingo7, and it has been a real breakthrough for me. The audio tracks are clear and well synchronised, which makes it easy to follow the text and improve pronunciation. The choice of texts is varied and engaging, covering different topics and genres. I like being able to adjust the speed and repeat fragments, which really helps me focus on difficult words.

  • Макс Рахвалов

    I have always wanted to learn German, and in this app everything is much more accessible and clearer than in similar ones. I have started with the flashcards for now, and I will move on to reading and audio once I have learned enough words. Overall the app is a 10 out of 10.

  • 😉

    Alfia3456

    I am learning Spanish for a move abroad. The audio is very high quality and sounds natural. The parallel text is convenient.

  • Katreena Katreena

    Installed it out of curiosity, and now I have been using it every day for 3 months. I am learning French. What won me over: real books, not made-up dialogues. Saving words plus review, and the vocabulary grows before your eyes.

  • I like it!

    Sergeev@2803₽!

    I moved to Czechia a year ago and needed to learn Czech quickly for work. Not many apps have it, I was surprised. I read texts with the translation, and the flashcards helped me memorise words. Now I talk at work and read documents. Thanks to the developers.

  • Юлия Близнюк

    I like that there is no gamification and no silly streaks here. You just read a book and learn. Like an adult. Thank you for the serious approach to language learning.

  • Review

    Altynbek55

    I am 63, and we go to Italy every year. I read a little before bed. The stories are interesting and the translation is right there, so you do not give up. The interface is simple. After 4 months I actually talked to a waiter in Rome. He was surprised!

  • Tala Tolstoy

    I have been learning Turkish for six months. I tried different apps before, and they were all grammar drills. Here you just read an interesting text with the translation right there. It sticks by itself. The most natural way to learn a language.

  • Nadezhda Nadezhda

    I am hooked on this app! The library is huge: classics, retellings, stories for different levels. The main difference is that you actually READ instead of just doing exercises. It feels like real studying.

  • Rosita Rose

    I needed Portuguese to work with a team from Brazil. Reading and audio at the same time is very effective, you train both listening and reading comprehension. The spaced repetition cards helped me build vocabulary quickly. After 6 weeks I could already follow meetings.

  • 👍

    Юлёк98

    I have tried every language app out there. What sets this one apart is parallel reading. Polyglots have learned this way for centuries, only here it is all in a convenient app. Tap a word and it gets saved, then you get quizzed at the right intervals. Much more natural than cramming flashcards in Anki.

  • Евгения Н

    a great service for practising English. you can pick a book by your level, the library is big enough for that. There are audio and text formats. The subscription is very reasonably priced.

  • Pixel

    I like it! It supports Serbian, five stars for that!

  • Denis Nefedov

    I have been looking for an app like this for a long time)

  • Вася Козлодоев

    the idea and the execution get a 5+. There is always something to improve, but right now this is the only app with Serbian books. well done! thank you!

More reviews on the App Store More reviews on Google Play

How to read with a translation

  1. Read the sentence in German first and work out the meaning from the words you know. Only then open the translation and compare.
  2. Press Listen and follow the highlighted words. Listen to the same story twice: once with the translation open, once without it. Then play it a third time and say the sentences along with the voice, a beat behind it (shadowing).
  3. Pick the level where you understand about 80 percent without the translation. Too easy is fine; too hard turns reading into decoding. Read a little every day.

Why comprehensible input works

See also

Texts by level in other languages

Questions about these texts

They are written for Lingo7 learners: short stories on history, nature, science, technology, philosophy and everyday life, about five minutes of reading each. Every story comes in two versions, adapted for A1-A2 and the original for B1-B2, and is translated sentence by sentence.

Yes, texts with a parallel translation, sentence by sentence. The translation is not in a second column: it sits right under each sentence in German, so your eyes stay on the original and drop to the translation only when needed. A tap on a word shows which word of the translation it matches. In the full story you can hide the translations and open one with a tap on its sentence, and pick the translation language: any of the other 49 Lingo7 languages.

Sentence by sentence and close to the original, so you can match the words, but written as natural sentences, not word for word. Where the two conflict, the meaning wins over the word order.

Yes. In the full story set the translation to "On tap", translate a sentence yourself, then tap it to compare with ours.

No. This page shows the first page of one story; the whole stories are in the Lingo7 app, where they work offline once opened and every word can be tapped for a translation.

This page is free. In Lingo7 you open any story and read its first page for free; a subscription unlocks all the stories, the audio and the word practice.

Press Listen and the story is read aloud in German by a native voice, with the current word highlighted. The recording is made from this exact text, so you can pause and reread any sentence.

Yes. Every story has an adapted version for A1-A2, rewritten in simpler language. Start there, and when it reads easily, switch the same story to the original for B1-B2.

Read the adapted example above without the translation. If you understand most of it and miss only a few words, start there. If it feels too easy, switch to the original. The adapted version is for A1-A2, the original for B1-B2, and after the stories come the books.

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