"Duolingo is confident that it can find ways to grow its subscriber base without adding more friction to its free tiers. Only about 10% of the language learning app's active monthly users pay for its services. Adding friction to the free experience has been the fastest way for Duolingo to increase monetization, but it came at the expense of daily active user growth."
"Instead of potentially disruptive monetization methods like increased ad loads or subscription upsells, Duolingo will lean into options like selling customizations for avatars. Duolingo is making a better free user experience one of its top three priorities as it aims for 100 million daily active users by 2028."
"Duolingo's year-over-year growth never fell below 40% from the second quarter of 2022 to the second quarter of 2025. However, growth dropped to 30% year over year in the fourth quarter of 2025. Despite the recent slowdown, Duolingo reached 52.7 million daily active users in the fourth quarter of 2025, with revenue rising 35% year over year to $282.9 million."
Duolingo's CEO Luis von Ahn announced the company will focus on enhancing its free tier rather than adding friction to monetize users. Currently, only 10% of monthly active users subscribe. While adding friction previously drove monetization gains, it slowed daily active user growth. The company experienced declining growth throughout 2025, dropping from 40%+ year-over-year rates to 30% in Q4. Despite this slowdown, Duolingo reached 52.7 million daily active users and $282.9 million in revenue. The company expects 20% year-over-year growth in 2026 and aims for 100 million daily active users by 2028, prioritizing free experience improvements and alternative monetization like avatar customizations.
#duolingo-monetization-strategy #free-user-experience #user-growth-slowdown #language-learning-app #non-disruptive-revenue-models
Read at www.customerexperiencedive.com
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]