Top 10 Websites to Learn English Online For Free

By Ben Schmidt Aug 4, 2022

The advent of the internet has turned our lives upside down – in a good way. It made impossible things easy to do. For example, accessing information generally was not a simple task in the old days. You had to buy books or journals, visit the library, consult experts, and so forth. Now an internet connection is all it takes to find whatever you want.

If you want help learning English, it’s a great idea to take advantage of the many unique websites offering language teaching services.

Top ten websites to learn English

BBC Learning English:

BBC Learning English was created by the British government to help learners of English. It has courses that take you from beginner to upper-intermediate level, ending with one that’s titled “Toward Advanced.”

It also has quizzes to help you practice what you learn. A great feature of this website is its News menu. It provides news articles that are written primarily to suit intermediate learners.

There are also videos followed by an explanation of keywords and phrases. These videos are great for listening skills as well as learning new words. If you go to www.bbc.co.uk/learningenglish, you’ll find plenty of other features encompassing all the language skills. All of them are free.

British Council Learn English:

British Council Learn English is another official and free website that teaches British English. It offers both live classes and self-study courses.

You can even get a personal online tutor who can teach you anytime you want (their tutors are available 24/7, so time will not be an issue).

You can also choose to focus on any specific skill you’d like to improve. This website includes lessons and materials for beginner and intermediate learners but not advanced ones.

VOA Learning English:

This website is a treasure mine for those who want to learn American English from scratch and reach the proficiency level.

It is well organized into sections for each level. They include lessons in both text and audio format. The audios are slow-paced, so they are great for learners who want to improve their listening skills.

They also offer a fifteen-minute English proficiency test that helps learners figure out their level. In addition to that, they have a US history section, which is excellent if you want to understand US culture, especially if you intend to travel there.

Talk English:

The strategy of this website is to teach reading, speaking, and listening simultaneously to help learners become fluent in English. They also teach basic grammar, idioms and phrases, English for interviews, and business English.

TED:

TED offers videos of people giving inspiring and educative speeches. It’s not a language teaching website per se, but it’s excellent for listening practice because the videos usually have subtitles in the original language. This way, you can look and see the words that you cannot understand. Subtitles are also great for expanding one’s vocabulary.

Globe Speaker:

This site currently teaches eight languages, including English. Their method includes games that help learners master a language while having fun.

English Club:

I can name nothing that this site doesn’t have. Once you visit it, you’ll see that it has all sorts of useful sections for language learners, organized into a long list. For example, there are lessons for grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation, and each of the four language skills: listening, speaking, reading, and listening.

There are games and quizzes so that you can practice all these lessons. There are also forums and chats so that you can discuss specific points with other learners and practice interacting in English.

Exam English:

Having a certificate that proves your current proficiency level is important. Students seeking a scholarship and job applicants can testify to that. But tests like the TOEFL and IELTS take a lot of studying and can be very intimidating. It would be helpful to have similar ones to practice with.

This is where Exam English comes to the rescue. It provides free online practice tests for each of the following exams: IELTS, TOEFL, TOFEIC, and the Cambridge English exams.

They also have a free test to determine your current level so that you know where to start.

Many Things:

Many Things is a website that offers valuable lessons for learners. They have sections like reading, listening, grammar, and vocabulary, and they also teach about idioms and proverbs, whose meaning cannot be deduced from the individual words that form them.

One of its remarkable features is its Listen and Read Along Videos. In these videos, stories from classic literature are read while the words are simultaneously highlighted.

Lyrics Training:

Songs are a tried-and-true way to learn a language. They help learners memorize meaning and pronunciation without feeling that they’re putting in any effort. They’re also helpful for improving listening skills. Besides, they’re not dull. In fact, they can get you engaged for hours without being tiresome or tedious.

Lyrics Training is a website that has come up with the clever idea of using songs to help learners.

The songs are the same ones that you hear from professional artists like Beyoncé or Billie Eilish. Choose any song you like, listen to, and fill the blanks with the missing words. You can also download their app from Google Play or the App Store.