Assimil - Learn languages

Please add Mandarin Chinese

Since I know from language learners with my target language that the Assimil book is great, I figured the app would be a great way to use Assimil. But the languages are very limited.

The material is great but the app crashes often and doesn’t save progress on the same device or between devices, so on reopening the app all lessons that are marked as complete are reset.

I've gotten a lot of value from Assimil books, so I looked forward to having that content in an electronic form. But the way you navigate this app, and the utterly confusing user interface, make this nearly impossible to use. Assimil publishes a PDF on their website about how to use the app, but a) it doesn't match the way the app works on an iPhone, and b) if your mobile app needs a PDF, you've failed. Be careful when you buy courses. If you buy without being logged into an Assimil account, you can't access the content on any other device, including other devices logged into your Apple account. Finally, Assimil says they have an app version that works on a Mac. They don't. It will download from the app store, but it throws off warnings that it isn't Mac compatible, and it doesn't work.

Assimil, you are a French company! How is it that you still have not made your advanced French course (Using French or whatever you are calling it now) available for purchase??!

This seems to be an incredible app. My problem is with purchasing. After trying it out I wanted to buy, but I purchased a French/Russian version instead of English/Russian. After getting no response from support I posted a negative review. After more digging I found a way to request a refund and the funds have been put back into my account. It looks as though I have full access to the English/Russian course that I thought was a trial version but there is no way to pay. Maybe I bought this in the past and forgot since I was looking at Russian a couple years ago. It would be nice to have contact with support to resolve these issues. It would making committing to this learning method smoother. My other problem is that I wanted to delete my previous review and replace it with this one and hopefully a five star review if I can ever get all this straightened out.

I have learned French from zero to nearly fluent few years ago using Assimil book and recordings. The Assimil method is amazing, many polyglots would agree. But the app... Terrible!!! I tried the trial version. It is clunky inelegant and incomprehensible. Kind of be opposite of their method. The heart of Assimil method is parallel text. You see the target language and your native language side to side. You translate, you repeat. It is so simple. Why not to make it like that in the app? Simple zoomable copy of the book with clickable sentences to activate the audio would be already huge improvement over this amateurish attempt. I implore the Assimil team to find a good developer for the app. As it is now, it is ruining the reputation of this legendary method. It could be so wonderful. Someday, I hope. For now, just buy the book and recordings.

👍.

I am extremely disappointed I was very excited when I saw that Assimil had an app where I could purchase their books in digital form, but unfortunately that’s where the good news ends. After purchasing my item the site simply timed-out and the book would not download. After many attempts I contacted Assimil by text but because of the time difference has been long and drawn out. Save yourself the aggravation and just buy the physical books. It’s a shame its a good idea but the execution is a disaster.

This is an expensive purchase to not have any support. I purchased on my iPhone. It won’t work at all on my IPad. Try to email through help on the app and that also isn’t working. This company needs to respond to help or not be sold on the App Store!