Besides individual time schedule, one of the greatest advantages of learning German online is variety. There is a free course for every level, taste and learning style. Whether you prefer a proper textbook, an entertaining video or an engaging game or mobile app, everything is available for free as long as you have an Internet access. Most courses can be also downloaded to your computer or mobile device for offline use. Moreover, there are free grammar exercises, assessment tests and mock exams that will be evaluated online to test your German knowledge. Do not be shy of online tests. They will show you where you are and where your strengths and weaknesses lie. Then you can choose courses that particularly address these weaknesses, e.g., lack of comprehension, conversation, grammar, writing or examination skills. To help you find the most suitable learning materials we have tested and selected several online courses and present them below.

Courses for Beginners

Most German courses have lessons for all levels of German speakers from beginners to advanced students. Here we show you a couple of those that are specifically tailored for beginners:

Radio D from Goethe Institute. The Goethe Institute is a cultural institute of the German Government promoting German language and culture throughout the world. The institute provides free German language online courses as well as paid classroom lessons in its nearly 160 officers around the world. Radio D is a course suitable for absolute beginners (level A1) as well as those who have some previous knowledge of the German language (level A2) divided in two series with 26 lessons each. In this course, two presenters Laura and Phillip investigate interesting cases and take you to different places in Germany. You can download this innovative course to your mobile device from iTunes for free.

Deutschtrainer from Deutsche Welle. Deutsche Welle is a publicly owned international broadcaster promoting Germany to audiences around the world. Deutschtrainer is a basic beginner course consisting of ten video lessons suitable for absolute beginners. All lessons are available for free download in different formats.

Courses for Intermediate and Advanced Students

There is an array of free online courses for intermediate and advanced students of German language freely available on the Internet serving every level, taste and learning style. We present a small sample of those that are provided by public German institutions. These courses are particularly suitable for those who wish to take official language proficiency examinations.

Deutsch am Arbeitsplatz is a German course from Goethe Institute for German learners at levels A1-B2. As its name suggests this course has been designed for all those who are wishing to find work in Germany. The focus is communication at a workplace.

Grüße aus Deutschland is a podcast from Goethe Institute consisting of 60 entertaining lessons available for free download from iTunes. This course has been designed for advanced students and is thus only available in German language.

Find the most suitable course is a page at the website of Deutsche Welle offering online courses for all levels of German speakers. German learners can choose from dozens of courses that address all aspects of language development. Most courses as well as course materials and transcripts can be freely downloaded to your computer or mobile device for offline use.

Marktplatz is one of the courses listed on the webpage mentioned above and it is dedicated to business German, i.e., common phrases and situations you may encounter if you wish to work in the fields of finance, trade or marketing. It is a B2 level course; hence all instructions are given only in German.

We will be adding more resources once we have evaluated them and they passed our test. We are also planning on adding new categories such as Occupational German Language Courses, Courses for Travellers and Courses for Children. However, this short list should be enough to get you started. It can never hurt to try several different courses as each of them focuses on developing specific language skills. Taking different courses is especially helpful if you want to improve your general language competency. Make sure you do not focus too much just on training your examination skills. After all, you want to be able to communication with real people, particularly native German speakers.