Duolingo averaged 58.7 million daily active users in Q2 2026, up 23% from 47.7 million a year earlier, according to its Q2 2026 shareholder letter. Paid subscribers reached 12.7 million and quarterly revenue reached $298.5 million, while the company’s medium-term goal is to reach 100 million DAUs in 2028. Those three figures anchor the Duolingo statistics below.
Duolingo has decided to prioritize user growth over monetization, and it estimates it is investing more than $50 million of foregone bookings into the free user experience. The early read is useful for anyone tracking the app: users are growing faster than paying subscribers. The sections below cover users, subscribers, revenue, languages, countries, the Duolingo English Test, and the research on whether the app teaches.
Key Takeaways
- DAU growth reached 23% year over year in Q2 2026, up from 21% in Q1 2026.
- Paid subscriber growth slowed to 17% in Q2 2026 from 21% in Q1 2026, trailing user growth for the quarter.
- Daily users equaled about 41.7% of monthly users in Q2 2026, up from about 32.9% in Q2 2024, based on figures Duolingo reports to investors.
- Quarterly revenue per daily active user came to about $5.09 in Q2 2026, against about $5.29 in Q2 2025, calculated from SEC-filed results.
- Customers in the United States accounted for 38% of Duolingo’s 2025 revenue, down from 45% in 2023, per Duolingo’s annual Form 10-K.
- Duolingo published 20,500 course units in Q1 2026, up from 1,800 per quarter in 2024, per the Q1 2026 shareholder letter.
Editor’s Choice
- Daily active users: 58.7 million in Q2 2026.
- Monthly active users: 140.6 million in Q2 2026, per Duolingo Investor Relations.
- Paid subscribers: 12.7 million at the end of Q2 2026, reported to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
- 2025 revenue: $1,037.6 million, up 39%.
- 2026 revenue growth guidance: Approximately 16.3% for the full year.
- Current user retention rate: An all-time high of 84%, according to Duolingo.
- Language courses: Over 250 as of December 31, 2025, according to the 10-K.
How many people use Duolingo?
- Duolingo averaged 58.7 million daily active users in Q2 2026, against 47.7 million in Q2 2025.
- Monthly active users reached 140.6 million for the three months ended June 30, 2026, a 10% year-over-year increase.
- Paid subscribers grew 17% to 12.7 million at period end.
- The current user retention rate, the proportion of current users who come back the next day, reached an all-time high of 84%.
- Duolingo offered over 250 total language courses to more than 130 million monthly active users as of December 31, 2025.
- The company had more than 900 employees, including more than 430 engineers, as of December 31, 2025.
| Metric | Q2 2025 | Q2 2026 |
|---|---|---|
| Daily active users (millions) | 47.7 | 58.7 |
| Monthly active users (millions) | 128.3 | 140.6 |
| Paid subscribers at period end (millions) | 10.9 | 12.7 |
| Revenue ($ millions) | 252.3 | 298.5 |
| Total bookings ($ millions) | 268.0 | 289.1 |
| Net income ($ millions) | 44.8 | 33.2 |
Source: Duolingo Q2 2026 Shareholder Letter
About This Data
Figures are compiled from 13 sources: 11 Duolingo SEC filings, shareholder letters and investor releases, plus the 2025 Duolingo Language Report and Duolingo’s efficacy studies page. They were published between August 2025 and September 2026. Only Duolingo’s own filings and publications qualify, because the company reports its user metrics itself. Figures are reviewed on a rolling basis and updated when Duolingo publishes new results.
Duolingo Daily Active Users by Quarter
- Duolingo ended 2025 at 52.7 million DAUs in Q4, up 30% from 40.5 million a year earlier.
- Q1 2026 DAUs rose 21% to 56.5 million.
- Q2 2026 DAU growth of 23% accelerated two percentage points sequentially, taking the quarter to 58.7 million.
- From Q2 2022 to Q2 2025, Duolingo did not have a single quarter with year-over-year DAU growth below 40%.
- Management expected 2026 DAU growth to be about 20%, and after Q2, said it expects growth for the rest of the year to remain above the 20% it had guided to.
- A one-time Streak Revival event in June let 15.4 million learners revive their streaks, including nearly 8 million users who had no active streak when the event began.
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Is Duolingo losing users?
No. Duolingo’s DAUs grew 23% year over year in Q2 2026. DAU growth did decelerate throughout 2025, and Duolingo’s annual report says an April 2025 memo on its use of AI may have contributed to unfavorable publicity and a deceleration in user growth. The latest quarter shows growth picking back up rather than reversing.
Recent Developments
- September 2026: Luis von Ahn was scheduled for a fireside chat at the Citi 2026 Global TMT Conference on September 9, 2026.
- August 2026: Duolingo acquired Animade, a London-based animation and motion design studio, to expand its Design Studio.
- August 2026: Duolingo appointed Sallie Krawcheck, a former Chief Financial Officer of Citigroup, to its board and its Audit, Risk and Compliance Committee.
- August 2026: Duolingo reported Q2 2026 results with DAU growth of 23% and raised its full-year Adjusted EBITDA margin outlook to approximately 26.5%.
- August 2026: Share repurchases totaled approximately $71.9 million through August 1, 2026.
Duolingo Monthly Active Users
- MAUs reached 140.6 million in Q2 2026, up 10% from 128.3 million.
- MAU growth accelerated four percentage points sequentially in Q2 2026.
- Q4 2025 MAUs were 133.1 million, up 14% from 116.7 million.
- Duolingo primarily evaluates user engagement using DAUs, with MAUs as a supplementary metric.
- DAUs equaled about 41.7% of MAUs in Q2 2026, up from about 32.9% in Q2 2024.
View the data
Why it matters: Duolingo calls its current user retention rate one of its most important leading indicators, because small improvements compound into large DAU gains, and the rate reached an all-time high of 84%. A rising share of monthly users who open the app daily is the engagement-over-growth pattern we see across platform statistics pages.
Duolingo Paid Subscribers
- Paid subscribers reached 12.7 million at the end of Q2 2026, up 17% from 10.9 million.
- The paid base grew 28% from 9.5 million at the end of Q4 2024 to 12.2 million at the end of Q4 2025.
- Paid subscribers equaled 9.0% of last-twelve-month MAUs in Q3 2025, up from 8.5% a year earlier.
- Subscription bookings rose 10% year over year in Q2 2026.
- Duolingo more than doubled the average number of words spoken per user in Video Call over the year to Q1 2026 and began expanding Video Call access to Super subscribers.
- Subscriber growth trailing user growth is the trade-off Duolingo chose; digital subscription statistics give the wider context for paid apps.
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Duolingo Revenue by Quarter
- Q2 2026 revenue rose 18% to $298.5 million.
- Q1 2026 revenue rose 27% to $292.0 million.
- Full-year 2025 revenue reached $1,037.6 million, up 39%.
- Subscription revenue grew 44% in 2025, faster than the 39% rise in total revenue.
- Duolingo said Q2 bookings growth slowed from Q1 because of a tough prior-year comparison given the initial rollout of Energy, a price increase, and advertising outperformance in the year-ago quarter.
- Revenue per DAU came to about $5.09 in Q2 2026, down from about $5.29 in Q2 2025. Reddit’s DAU and revenue figures offer a public comparison point.
View the data
The takeaway: Duolingo estimated it is investing more than $50 million of foregone bookings, or about 5 points of year-over-year bookings growth, into the free user experience. Quarterly revenue per DAU slipped to about $5.09. Users are growing faster than the money each one brings in, which is the plan working as described.
Duolingo Revenue by Country and Product
- Customers in the United States accounted for 38%, 42%, and 45% of total revenue in 2025, 2024, and 2023.
- In dollar terms, US revenue reached $392.2 million in 2025, and Rest of World revenue reached $645.4 million.
- Revenue from the rest of the world was about 1.6 times US revenue in 2025.
- No other country accounted for more than 10% of revenue.
- Over half of Duolingo’s bookings come from outside the US, and every 1% change in the dollar against its currency basket equates to about a $4 million impact on H2 2026 bookings.
- Apple, Google, and Stripe processed 59.6%, 23.2%, and 11.9% of total revenues in Q2 2026, which ties Duolingo closely to App Store economics and Google Play Store trends.
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Rest of World revenue grew about 2.2 times between 2023 and 2025. The regional split shows where paying users sit; the product split below shows what they pay for.
- Subscription revenue reached $258.0 million in Q2 2026, about 86.5% of total revenue.
- Subscription revenue rose 22% year over year in Q2 2026, and advertising revenue rose 2%. In-app purchase revenue fell about 23%.
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Duolingo Statistics on Profit, Bookings and Guidance
- Duolingo reported 2025 net income of $414.1 million and Adjusted EBITDA of $305.9 million, a 29.5% margin.
- The 2025 net income included a one-time income-tax benefit of $256.7 million from releasing a valuation allowance.
- Q2 2026 Adjusted EBITDA was $77.3 million, a 25.9% margin, against 31.2% a year earlier.
- For 2026, Duolingo expects bookings growth of approximately 10.9%, revenue growth of approximately 16.3%, and Adjusted EBITDA of approximately $320.0 million, a 26.5% margin.
- For Q3 2026, Duolingo expects revenue growth of approximately 11.1% and Adjusted EBITDA of approximately $76.0 million, a 25.2% margin.
- Duolingo ended Q2 2026 with approximately $1.3 billion in cash and short-term investments.
| Metric | FY 2025 actual | FY 2026 guidance |
|---|---|---|
| Total bookings ($ millions) | 1,158.4 | 1,285 |
| Revenue ($ millions) | 1,037.6 | 1,207 |
| Adjusted EBITDA ($ millions) | 305.9 | 320 |
| Adjusted EBITDA margin | 29.5% | 26.5% |
Source: Duolingo Q4 2025 and Q2 2026 Shareholder Letters
Most Popular Languages on Duolingo
- English, Spanish, French, Japanese, and German were the five most studied languages on Duolingo in 2025.
- Japanese became the fourth most popular language to study globally in 2025, passing German, and Korean moved past Italian.
- English was the most studied language in 79% of all countries and became the top language in 154 countries, an increase of 14% over 2024.
- Just 25 countries do not have English among their top two most popular languages.
- Duolingo launched 148 new courses in 2025 for speakers of more than 20 languages.
| Rank | Language |
|---|---|
| 1 | English |
| 2 | Spanish |
| 3 | French |
| 4 | Japanese |
| 5 | German |
| 6 | Korean |
| 7 | Italian |
| 8 | Chinese |
| 9 | Portuguese |
| 10 | Hindi |
Source: 2025 Duolingo Language Report
The ranking shows what learners pick worldwide; the country counts below show how lopsided the first choice is. English ranked first in 154 countries, against 26 for Spanish.
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Duolingo Users by Country and Region
- French was the second most popular language in 60 countries, ahead of Spanish in 48 and German in 22.
- Japan took the top spot among polyglot countries in 2025, followed by Australia, Finland, Germany and the U.K.
- Japan claimed the top spot among countries with the most serious learners, based on average time spent learning, for the third time in four years.
- In China, Indonesia and India, roughly two-thirds of Duolingo’s social impressions came from influencer-generated content.
- Over 26,000 Luckin Coffee stores in Asia partnered with Duolingo in Q3 2025, selling more than 10 million Duolingo-branded drinks in two weeks.
- The 2025 Duolingo Language Report covers learners from October 1, 2024, to September 30, 2025, and excludes countries with fewer than 5,000 Duolingo learners.
- Duolingo does not break out user counts by country in its filings, so the language rankings and the US revenue share are the closest public proxies; mobile app statistics fill in the wider market picture.
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Second-choice languages are spread far more evenly than first choices, and the country rankings below show where learners study the most. Hungary, Belarus, Russia and Germany rounded out the top 5 countries for serious learners behind Japan.
| Rank | Most polyglot countries | Most serious learners |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Japan | Japan |
| 2 | Australia | Hungary |
| 3 | Finland | Belarus |
| 4 | Germany | Russia |
| 5 | U.K. | Germany |
Source: 2025 Duolingo Language Report
Duolingo English Test Statistics
- Asia accounted for 55% of all test sessions, while Africa’s share rose from 7% to 8.3%.
- Mandarin, Spanish, and Arabic speakers together comprised about 31% of all sessions.
- Duolingo derived approximately 4.0% of its total revenue in 2025 from the Duolingo English Test.
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Countries test takers came from, 2025 | 219 |
| First languages of test takers, 2025 | 148 |
| Asia share of test sessions, 2025 | 55% |
| Africa share of test sessions, 2025 | 8.3% |
| Share of Duolingo revenue, 2025 | Approximately 4.0% |
| Q2 2026 revenue ($ millions) | 10.109 |
Source: 2025 Duolingo Language Report; Duolingo Form 10-K and Form 10-Q, 2025 and 2026
By the numbers: The Duolingo English Test produced approximately 4.0% of Duolingo’s 2025 revenue, yet people from 219 countries took it, with Asia accounting for 55% of all test sessions. Its value to Duolingo sits in reach and brand credibility more than in revenue.
Duolingo AI, Content and New Subject Statistics
- Duolingo published 20,500 course units in Q1 2026, up from 7,100 per quarter in 2025 and 1,800 per quarter in 2024.
- That is about 11 times the 2024 quarterly pace. AI tooling is the reason Duolingo gives, and the wider AI in education statistics put that shift in context.
- Courses teaching Duolingo’s 9 most-learned languages now have content up to Duolingo Score 129, or CEFR B2.
- Spoken tokens let learners speak their answers to most exercises instead of tapping the words.
- Chess had over a million DAUs at the end of Q2 2025, on iOS and in English only.
- Chess, Duolingo’s fastest-growing subject, reached more than seven million DAUs in less than a year.
- Duolingo cites roughly one billion people learning K-12 math globally as the opportunity for its math course.
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Beyond the language courses, Duolingo is putting more resources into chess, math, and music as part of its overall growth strategy for the whole app. The medium-term goal of that strategy is to reach 100 million DAUs in 2028.
| Subject or milestone | Figure | Period |
|---|---|---|
| Chess DAUs | Over a million (iOS, English only) | End of Q2 2025 |
| Chess DAUs | More than seven million | Less than a year after launch |
| K-12 math learners worldwide | Roughly one billion | Duolingo estimate, February 2026 |
| Total language courses | Over 250 | December 31, 2025 |
Source: Duolingo Q2 2025 and Q4 2025 Shareholder Letters; Form 10-K, fiscal 2025
What is a good Duolingo Score?
Duolingo describes a Duolingo Score of 129, which is B2 on the CEFR scale, as the level at which learners can get a job in that language. Its courses for the 9 most-learned languages now teach up to that level. Anything near 129 is a strong score by Duolingo’s own benchmark.
Duolingo Efficacy Studies
- After studying math on Duolingo for 4 weeks in the summer, rising 8th graders improved their scores by 14%, per a 2026 Duolingo research report.
- Two peer-reviewed studies compared Duolingo learners with classroom learners after one semester: English learners scored higher on proficiency tests in 2025, and French learners matched classroom learners on communication skills in 2026.
- A 2023 randomized clinical trial found that learning a language on Duolingo for four months improved seniors’ brain health.
| Year | Study type | Finding |
|---|---|---|
| 2026 | Duolingo research report | Rising 8th graders improved math scores by 14% after 4 weeks |
| 2026 | Peer-reviewed study | French learners were comparable to classroom learners on communication skills after one semester |
| 2025 | Peer-reviewed study | English learners outscored classroom learners on proficiency tests after one semester |
| 2025 | Peer-reviewed study | Learners felt more positive about their skills after one month of Duolingo Max |
| 2024 | Peer-reviewed study | Speaking, reading, writing, and listening improved after 3 months |
| 2024 | Duolingo research report | Beginners learned basic conversational skills after 4 to 6 weeks |
| 2023 | Peer-reviewed study | Four months of language learning improved seniors’ brain health |
Source: Duolingo Efficacy Studies, 2023 to 2026
Key finding: A 2026 peer-reviewed study by Kim, Payant, Skalicky and Namkung found that after studying French for one semester, Duolingo learners’ communication skills were comparable to classroom learners. That is a narrower result than fluency: it covers beginner-level French over a single semester, which is how most of these studies should be read.
Can you become fluent with Duolingo?
The published evidence does not show fluency. Duolingo’s courses for its 9 most-learned languages teach up to a Duolingo Score of 129, or CEFR B2, and a 2024 peer-reviewed study measured gains in all four skills after 3 months of use. That points to intermediate skills; online learning statistics cover how apps fit into wider study.
Conclusion
Duolingo’s 58.7 million daily active users and 12.7 million paid subscribers in its latest quarter describe a company that chose reach over monetization and, so far, is getting the reach. Adjusted EBITDA margin fell to 25.9% from 31.2% a year earlier, the visible cost of that choice alongside slower subscriber growth.
The company’s medium-term goal is 100 million DAUs, and management expects DAU growth to stay above 20% for the rest of the year. The next shareholder letter will show whether the reacceleration holds; learners can read the efficacy research above to judge how far the app takes them.
