Free Chinese (Simplified) learning resources
26 free resources, checked and categorised.
Every link is usable without paying. Some ask for a free account or keep extras behind a paid tier, and those are labelled.
Chinese separates cleanly into two problems, and treating them as one is what makes it feel impossible. The grammar is genuinely simple: no conjugation, no tenses, no gender, no plurals. The writing system and the tones are the whole difficulty, and they are largely independent of each other.
Start tones on day one, in whole words rather than in isolation. Tones learned late are extremely hard to fix, because you will have spent months building muscle memory for the wrong shape. Do not treat them as an advanced topic.
For characters, learn them as combinations of repeating components rather than as pictures to memorise. Most characters contain a part hinting at meaning and a part hinting at sound; once you see that, the several-thousand-character mountain becomes a few hundred pieces recombined.
Pinyin is a useful bridge and a trap if you stay on it. Move to characters early, keep a dictionary that handles handwriting or component lookup, and expect reading to lag speaking for a long time.
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Blog post recommending five free Chinese podcasts, each briefly described as listening practice with natural conversation, news, or literature readings
Podcast archive of over 100 hours of preserved Mandarin audio recordings from Seton Hall University, with 29 listed episodes to download or stream
Podcast archive of over 100 hours of recorded Mandarin lessons from Seton Hall University, with episodes you can play or subscribe to in iTunes
Podcast course with 46 short Mandarin Chinese audio lessons, covering greetings, numbers, pronunciation and tones, directions, food, and transcripts.
Podcast archive of over 100 hours of beginner Mandarin audio recordings, with episodes available to download or subscribe to in iTunes
Audio Mandarin lessons in a progressive podcast course, with 60 Level 1 episodes and references to flashcards, exercises, and other resources
Free Wikibooks textbook for Standard Mandarin with lessons on pronunciation, vocabulary, and short dialogues, plus dictionaries and appendices.
Chinese learning blog with grammar articles by level, vocabulary notes, and podcast-related listening practice tips, plus a few converter tools.
Free online Chinese grammar reference with 2,125 articles, organized by level and part of speech, for reading explanations and example sentences
Archived Chinese word order practice course with Level 1 and Level 2 materials from COERLL, giving learners exercises on sentence order
Chinese learner forum with discussion threads where users ask and answer questions about grammar, pronunciation, characters, exams, and culture
Seven-module beginner Mandarin course with videos, readings, and 28 assignments on pronunciation, daily expressions, and basic conversation.
Six-module beginner Chinese course with short videos, readings, and assignments on greetings, daily life, food, health, and speaking/listening practice
Public-domain FSI Mandarin course with student textbook, workbook, and audio tapes arranged in nine situational modules plus a resource module
It's full of great advice for how to study the language at all levels, and also hosts monthly challenges that rotate between reading, listening, speaking, and writing. The articles can be searched by level (beginner, intermediate, advanced) or by skill (listening, reading, speaking, writing, vocabulary). I've been referencing this blog for at least 5 years now and I love it so much!
Podcast archive with over 100 hours of digitized Mandarin Chinese recordings, featuring episode downloads for listening practice.
"40 online lessons with audio, including reading, speaking, writing, modern vocabulary, grammar, calligraphy, examples and exercices. All texts and dialogs in mp3 format for download."
Searchable English-to-Chinese dictionary with Mandarin pinyin, handwriting recognition, example queries, and word lookup by Chinese, pinyin, or English
Audio Mandarin lessons with PDF transcripts, situational dialogues, vocabulary explanations, reviews, and 270+ lessons plus some videos and worksheets
Chinese dictionary and reference app for iOS and Android with OCR, handwriting lookup, audio, flashcards, document reading, and stroke-order guides
Podcast blog archive with episode posts and vocabulary lists, covering Chinese news and current-events discussions for listening and reading practice
Blog posts in Polish about Chinese learning, school updates, and short articles on language, culture, and current events in China
Free Chinese eBooks on Project Gutenberg, browsed by language and read online or downloaded from a large catalog of texts
Video streaming and sharing platform with searchable Chinese clips, short videos, and series you can watch by topic or browse through recommended listings
Chinese video streaming platform with TV dramas, films, variety shows, anime, documentaries, and cultural programs; watch and browse thousands of episodes and clips.
Learn it there, practise it here
Free resources are great for input: reading, listening, explanations. They are weaker at the two things that actually move you forward: speaking Chinese (Simplified) out loud, and remembering what you met once. That is what OwnSlides is for.
Say it out loud
Talk to an AI tutor that answers back, or get matched with other learners and native speakers for a text chat.
Practise what you read
Turn a grammar point or article into exercises, so it moves from recognised to usable.
Keep the words
Save new words to My Words and let spaced repetition bring them back before you forget them.
This directory began from a community-built list of free language resources, a year of collecting and checking by Joanna (u/chlebka) and dozens of contributors who suggested links, shared freely. See the original list. We have since expanded, re-checked and re-categorised it, and we keep the per-resource credits where the original list recorded them.