Duolingo
Headquarters
Pittsburgh, PAFounded
2011CEO / Founder
Luis von AhnEmployees
501-1000Funding
PublicStock
DUOLProducts
1 product listedAvg. AI Score
7.3/10Website
www.duolingo.com
Profile updated
About Duolingo
Duolingo is a language-learning company founded in 2011 in Pittsburgh by Luis von Ahn and Severin Hacker. Its free, gamified app teaches more than 40 languages to over 100 million monthly active users and over 30 million daily users.
Duolingo has expanded beyond languages into math, music, and chess products, and monetizes through Super Duolingo subscriptions, Duolingo Max (AI-powered plan), and the Duolingo English Test.
The company went public on NASDAQ in 2021 (DUOL) and reported more than $700 million in annual revenue. Luis von Ahn, co-inventor of CAPTCHA and reCAPTCHA, remains CEO.
Specialties
Financials
Dated, source-cited figures. Estimates are marked.
Products by Duolingo
All products by Duolingo reviewed by our AI panel of experts.
How Our Review Panel Scores Duolingo
Six independent reviewer personalities assessed Duolingo's product on their own terms. They landed within 0.7 points of each other, an unusually strong consensus.
Averaged across 1 reviewed product in our catalog. Scores are out of 10.
Competitive Landscape
Who Duolingo competes with, and how they differ.
Subscription-first, ad-free language courses built by in-house linguists rather than crowd-sourced gamified content; a smaller free tier than Duolingo's free-forever, ad-supported model, targeting adults who want structured lessons over game mechanics.
Pairs AI-personalized study plans with a native-speaker community that reviews learners' writing and speaking, competing on human feedback quality where Duolingo leans on automated AI grading (Duolingo Max) and gamified repetition.
Free, donor-funded education platform spanning math, science and humanities rather than language-specific content; competes with Duolingo for the same daily self-directed-learning habit and races it on AI tutoring (Khanmigo vs. Duolingo Max).
1 product reviewed on TopReviewedCompany Timeline
Key milestones in Duolingo's history, with sources.
- Milestone
Reports first year surpassing $1B in bookings
Duolingo reported FY2025 results: more than $1 billion in bookings for the first time and over 50 million daily active users, per its Q4/FY25 shareholder letter filed with the SEC.
sec.gov - Acquisition
Acquires Hobbes
Duolingo acquired Hobbes, a design studio, continuing its pattern of acquiring small creative/animation studios to build in-house content production capacity.
en.wikipedia.org - Launch
Launches Duolingo Max
Duolingo launched Max, an AI-powered subscription tier adding generative-AI features (like Explain My Answer and Roleplay) on top of the core app.
en.wikipedia.org - Acquisition
Acquires Gunner
Duolingo acquired Gunner, an animation and design studio, to build out in-house video/animation capabilities for its content.
en.wikipedia.org - Milestone
Goes public on NASDAQ (DUOL)
Duolingo went public on NASDAQ under ticker DUOL, becoming a publicly traded company.
en.wikipedia.org - Funding
Series F — $30M led by CapitalG at $1.5B valuation
Duolingo raised a $30 million Series F round led by CapitalG (Alphabet's growth fund), reaching unicorn status at a $1.5 billion valuation shortly before its 2021 IPO.
en.wikipedia.org - Funding
Series D — $45M led by Google Capital at $470M valuation
Duolingo raised a $45 million Series D round led by Google Capital at a $470 million valuation.
en.wikipedia.org - Launch
Public app launch
Duolingo launched its language-learning app to the general public; its waiting list had grown to around 500,000 users by that point.
en.wikipedia.org - Funding
Series A — $3.3M led by Union Square Ventures
Duolingo raised a $3.3 million Series A round led by Union Square Ventures, its first institutional funding.
en.wikipedia.org - Founded
Founded at Carnegie Mellon University
Luis von Ahn and Severin Hacker founded Duolingo, building on a free-language-education idea von Ahn conceived in 2009.
en.wikipedia.org
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