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How long does French take to learn?
When learning French, English speakers get a massive, and I mean MASSIVE, language discount that, if I’m being honest, makes the language seem very familiar at first glance. The hours break down thusly:
- Survival basics (A2) – 200
- Everyday conversations (B1) – 400
- Comfortable fluency (B2) – 800
- Near-native fluency (C1) – 1,400
This familiarity is all down to a little bit of invasion and conquering in 1066 (if you know, you know). The Normans were so kind as to donate a bunch (thousands) of their words to us. Hence why, in some cases, without having studied any French, an erudite native English speaker could very well get the gist of a paragraph that’s written entirely in French.
Now, listening is something completely different, as you probably already know. French might just be one of the least phonetic languages out there. So you’re gonna spend a good chunk of those study hours honing your listening skills. Don’t say we didn’t warn you.
For a number that’s tailored to your actual situation, play around with the calculator above. That’s what we built it for 🙂