Use our free language learning time calculator to get a personalised estimate!
How long does Latin take to learn?
Latin’s kind of an outlier in the sense that, outside of a handful of hardcore Latin “fiends” and a few dozen priests in the Vatican, no one actually speaks it. It’s considered a dead language; you’re not exactly expected to learn it for conversation. So, bear in mind that the following numbers are mostly based on reading and writing. The hours break down as such:
- Survival basics (A2) – 200
- Everyday conversations (B1) – 400
- Comfortable fluency (B2) – 800
- Near-native fluency (C1) – 1,400
For English speakers, Latin will be very familiar. It’s sprinkled, like, everywhere throughout the language, making up around 30% of English’s vocabulary. (Seriously, I was flabbergasted when I started studying it and could, at first glance, recognise and immediately understand many of the words.)
So that’s your language discount right there. You’ll be making basic sentences quickly, and you won’t have to faff around with those pesky articles, as Latin has none (neither direct nor indirect).
That said, you’re in for a wild ride when it comes to the infamous Latin grammar. If this is your first foray into language learning and you didn’t go to grammar school, the six Latin cases will boggle your mind. That’s where a lot of your study time will be spent, so be prepared.
The good news is that Latin is a logical language. And the bonus here is, once you have it down, you’ve given yourself a huge discount on the over two dozen Romance languages (Italian, Spanish, and Romanian among them). Not bad, huh?
For a number that’s tailored to your specific situation, play around with the calculator above. That’s what we built it for 🙂