How Long Does It Take to Learn a Language?

Quick answer: For English speakers, the US Foreign Service Institute puts languages in four difficulty tiers — about 600 hours for the easiest (Spanish, French), 1,100 hours for hard ones (Russian, Polish), and 2,200 hours for the hardest (Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Korean). Conversational B1 comes at roughly half those hours. Pick a language below for its honest timeline.

Moving abroad? The level you actually need is set by your destination — B1 for German or Italian citizenship, B2 for France, A2 for the Netherlands or Spain. See the exact language requirements by country →

Category I · easiest (~600h)

Spanish~600h French~600h Italian~600h Portuguese~600h Dutch~600h Norwegian~575h Swedish~575h Danish~575h

Category II (~750–900h)

Indonesian~900h German~750h

Category III · hard (~1,100h)

Greek~1,100h Hindi~1,100h Russian~1,100h Czech~1,100h Polish~1,100h Turkish~1,100h Thai~1,100h Vietnamese~1,100h

Category IV · hardest (~2,200h)

Arabic~2,200h Mandarin Chinese~2,200h Japanese~2,200h Korean~2,200h

Frequently asked questions

How long does it take to learn a language?

For English speakers, easy (FSI Category I) languages like Spanish take ~600 hours to professional proficiency; Category III like Russian ~1,100 hours; and the hardest (Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Korean) ~2,200 hours. Conversational B1 is roughly half those figures.

What is the easiest language to learn for English speakers?

FSI Category I languages are easiest — Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese, Dutch and the Scandinavian languages, at about 575–600 hours to professional level.

What is the hardest language to learn?

FSI Category IV (super-hard) languages take about 2,200 hours: Arabic, Mandarin Chinese, Japanese and Korean.