Speak app review: is it good for Chinese, and how do Praktika and Talkpal compare? (video)
Our Speak app review for Mandarin: what its new Chinese course covers, whether it checks your tones, and how Praktika and Talkpal compare on price.
Chapters
- 0:00Start
- 0:23The short answer
- 0:43Only Speak teaches a course
- 1:18Zero to B1
- 2:09Who checks your tones?
- 3:26Praktika
- 4:13Talkpal
- 4:50Long plans cost less
- 5:36Pick by how you practise
- 5:56Where SayMei fits
- 6:20What to do next
Transcript
Start
Speak added Chinese on 2 June 2026. Yet of the two Speak reviews at the top of our search, one never mentions Chinese, and the other lists it in passing. So is Speak any good for Chinese? From SayMei Guides, by Mei Lin: our Speak app review. Is it good for Chinese, and how do Praktika and Talkpal compare?
The short answer
The short answer: yes, if you're a beginner who wants a speaking course and will pay for it. Speak is the only one of these three with a real Chinese course, from zero to intermediate. But it doesn't say it checks your tones, and there's no free plan. Premium costs $83.99 a year.
Only Speak teaches a course
All three apps let you talk to a tutor in Mandarin, but only Speak builds a course around it. Praktika and Talkpal sell one app for every language: Chinese is one of 14 on Praktika, and one of more than 130 on Talkpal. We read each app's own pages on 16 October 2026. So here's the quick version. Speak is for beginners who want a course. Praktika is for chatting with an avatar tutor. Talkpal is for free daily practice. And SayMei, which publishes this guide, makes a speaking app too.
Zero to B1
Speak called Chinese its most-requested language for years. The course runs from beginner to B1, intermediate on the European scale, in Simplified characters. Each unit, Speak says, has a pronunciation lesson that drills its words, simulated conversations where you use them, and short cards and videos on grammar and culture. Those conversations happen at a boba shop, a souvenir stall or in a taxi. Later units move to harder talk, like negotiating a lease. One even has you order by scanning a QR code, as people do across China. Two gaps stand out. The launch post never mentions HSK, and it promised more on the way this summer. We found no later post saying what arrived. For a beginner, that's plenty. If you're aiming at an HSK exam, Speak has little for you yet.
Who checks your tones?
Now the big question: does any of them tell you when a tone is wrong? We read every page each app publishes about its feedback. Only Talkpal makes that promise, and only on its blog. Speak trains your ear first. Praktika never mentions tones. And we found no independent test of any of them. Speak comes closest. Its App Store listing promises an assessment of pronunciation, intonation and fluency, for every language. But its help page says the Pronunciation Coach, its detailed pronunciation tool, is only for people learning English. Why is this so hard? Speech recognition turns your voice into the most likely words. Take 我想问你, I want to ask you. Give the word for ask a third tone instead of a fourth, and you've said 我想吻你, I want to kiss you. A recognizer that leans on context may still write ask, and your mistake disappears. Even Speak's engineers wrote, in May 2026, that speech recognition tidies up what you meant and hides a learner's slips. And a review of 15 studies found this kind of practice helps individual sounds a lot, but pitch only a little. Tones are pitch. So speak a lot with these apps, and check your tones another way.
Praktika
Praktika is built around lifelike avatar tutors you talk to by voice. You get tutors with their own personalities, lessons sorted by goal, like travel or job interviews, lessons built from your own photo or PDF, and corrections you can tune from soft to strict. Its feedback scores pronunciation, rhythm and fluency. The free version gives you 3 tutors and basic feedback. The price is hard to pin down. The US App Store lists ten Premium purchases, from $6.99 to $139.99, including $9.99 for a month and $119.99 for a year. Its homepage says about $8 a month. So check the price the app shows you.
Talkpal
Talkpal has the clearest free plan of the three: 10 minutes of basic chat a day. Its modes run from open chat and calls to word drills, roleplays and debates. What it lacks is anything built for Chinese. We found no Chinese course or HSK path, and pronunciation feedback is a Premium feature. Premium costs $19.99 a month, or as little as $6.24 a month on its longest plan, with a 14-day free trial. If your budget is zero, start here. Ten minutes a day is enough to find out whether talking to an app suits you.
Long plans cost less
Now the money. Speak and Talkpal charge far less a month if you commit. Speak Premium is $17.99 a month, or $83.99 a year, about $7 a month. Talkpal drops from $19.99 to $6.24. Speak Premium Plus drops from $39.99 to $13.75. Praktika shows $9.99 for a month, and SayMei is $5.99. Watch the trial terms. Speak's 7-day trial needs a payment method, and you're charged unless you cancel at least a day before it ends. And for a beginner working through the course, we think Premium is enough.
Pick by how you practise
So which one? Speak, if you're a beginner who wants a course. Praktika, if you want to chat with a patient tutor. Talkpal, for free daily practice. And none of them if you're studying for HSK, since none follows HSK levels. If tones worry you most, add a human tutor now and then.
Where SayMei fits
And SayMei? It does one thing these three don't: spoken lessons sorted by HSK level. Mei Lin, SayMei's teacher, corrects your tones and grammar as you talk, for $5.99 a month for 200 minutes. Where it loses: it runs in a browser, with no offline mode, capped minutes, no pronunciation score, and far less free time than Talkpal.
What to do next
What to do next? Start Speak's trial or Talkpal's free plan, and talk every day for a week. Test the tone feedback yourself: say 糖, sugar, when the app expects 汤, soup, and see whether it notices. And buy a long plan only once you're sure. You can practise speaking with Mei Lin, SayMei's teacher, in a short spoken lesson at your level. The full review, with every source, is on the page at saymei dot app.