Summer came and went. There's only 3 months left in 2023!

With both of our apps now out (iOS and Android), this is the first quarter we've spent in a long time where we focused the majority of our attention on how Glossika looks and works, whether that's what we want it to be doing, and whether it seems to be satisfying for the people (like you, hopefully!) who are using it.

What became apparent was that many of the improvements we'd like to make and the features we'd like to create will be bigger projects. We've got a pretty packed roadmap for the next couple years.

For now, we've freshened Glossika with a newer, cleaner look.

(As always you can sign up for a free trial to try Glossika out! It's totally free for 7 days, gives you access to all three of our platforms [web, iOS, Android], and doesn't require a credit card.)

Our dashboard redesign is now live!

We're happy to announce that our redesigned dashboard is officially out on iOS and Web. In addition to being a much-needed visual update, the new dashboard comes with several quality-of-life features.

Here are some key changes you'll notice:

• Sleeker, modern design
  It was time for Glossika to get a new look. The new design is cleaner, makes your progress more visible, and should feel more intuitive for newer users.  
• Levels display / “Switch Levels” button
  Levels are now visible on the dashboard. You can manually switch to a lower level with the press of a button — placement test no longer needed!  
• Memory is now Library
  What was known as “Memory” is now called the “Library”. Here you can access all of your learned and saved content.  
• Temporary removal of Topics, Stories, and Vocab
  We'll revamp these features, then re-release a better and more intuitive version of them in the future.

Features currently on our roadmap

Offline Mode for Android will arrive within the next few weeks.  

On the iOS side of things, we’re in the early stages of two new projects:

• Expanded settings menu
  Maybe you want to hear target language audio before base language audio. Maybe you want to hide the target language's text. This and more will now be possible. (This will be a start for more flexibilty to come in the future.)
• Pronunciation feedback
  There are a lot of directions we could go with this. We'll start with something simple and iterate over time in response to user feedback.

Partnership with Outlier Linguistics

We’re excited to announce that Glossika has officially partnered with the folks over at Outlier Linguistics. We've been good friends for over a decade, they're brilliant linguists, and I'm excited to see what we're going to build together.

For the time being, we encourage learners of Japanese and Mandarin to check out their excellent introductory course material:

• Get Speaking Mandarin
  Guiding you through the basics from zero
• Mandarin Pronunciation & Accent Masterclass
  Master the pronunciation & tones of Mandarin and develop a clear accent
• Chinese Character Masterclass
  Learn how Chinese characters actually work and how to learn them
• (Japanese) Kanji Masterclass
  Their popular course on Chinese characters, adapted for Japanese learners

(We've actually interviewed both of the founders in the past! Here's Ash on how to study Chinese characters, and John on the history of Chinese characters.)

The "Ask a Polyglot" Newsletter

Have you ever ran into a problem and wished you could pick the brain of an experienced language learner to look for answers?

Well, back in June we sent out a survey to get input on what sort of communications y'all wanted to see from us. As people who think we send a lot of emails, we were a little surprised to see that people overwhelmingly wanted more emails from us... so long as it wasn't sales-y or market-y in nature.

Frankly, that seemed like a lot of fun, so we decided to launch a new newsletter.

Enter "Ask a Polyglot"!

• Each week we'll take questions from learners
• We'll keep track of the most common questions
• We'll pick the brains of our polyglots to provide a concise and informative answer (~400 words, or a ~2 minute read)

If that sounds like something you'd want in your inbox, you can sign up for the newsletter here.

That's all for now. We've got some cool plans for the coming months, but I can't quite talk about them... yet. Look forward to the Year in Review update this December!

Read More

1. Glossika's Quickstart Guide: The Top 5 Things New Users Need to Know
2. The Glossika Method: How We Develop Your Language Abilities
3. Previous updates: June 2023
4. Follow Glossika on YouTube / Instagram / Facebook / Twitter