How To Create a Duolingo Clone

By: Justin Ferriman • January 12, 2017
Filed Under:

If you have ever studied a language online then chances are you have come across the popular Duolingo program.

The teaching method relies heavily upon gamification elements to teach key language concepts. In fact, it’s one of the best examples of gamification currently on the market. It’s no secret why many learning programs want to emulate their offering.

I think this is a good time to mention something: you will be hard-pressed to create an exact replica of Duolingo for a few hundred dollars.

Their learning management system is a complete custom build and has massive amounts of investment (both in time and money).

That said, you can still capture some of the key elements from Duolingo in your own learning program.

Creating Your Duolingo Clone

Duolingo boasts a lot of features but there are some key components that stand out over the others. We’ll focus on how you can achieve these features with WordPress.

Core Feature #1: Course Creation

This is where LearnDash comes into the picture. LearnDash makes it easy to create robust online courses leveraging WordPress. You can also prevent users from skipping around in your course until they successfully demonstrate that they have learned the content by passing checkpoint quizzes (a key feature that exists in Duolingo).

Core Feature #2: Gamification

The “bread-and-butter” of Duolingo. To implement gamification elements like badges, points, and leaderboards with WordPress & LearnDash all you need is to use BadgeOS. The great thing about BadgeOS is that it can connect to a user’s LinkedIn profile so that they can take their achievements with them, so to speak. This is exactly what Duolingo allows.

Core Feature #3: Forums

When you learn a language on Duolingo you have the opportunity to interact in course related forums. LearnDash has you covered with forums as well with the bbPress integration.

Core Feature #4: Social Interaction

Duolingo is a truly social platform where you can build out your user profile. Using the BuddyPress integration for LearnDash you can do the exact same thing.

Putting It All Together

The final thing you will need to do is to “package” all of those core features together in an attractive way. The easiest way to do this is to use a WordPress theme like Social Learner by BuddyBoss (although you can use any modern WordPress theme you wish).

And that’s it! You’re well on your way to emulating some of the popular features that Duolingo offers to their users in their program.

Justin Ferriman

Justin started LearnDash, the WordPress LMS trusted by Fortune 500 companies, major universities, training organizations, and entrepreneurs worldwide. He is currently founder & CEO of GapScout. Justin’s Homepage | GapScout | Twitter