Review Insights · App Store
Rosetta Stone Classic (2024)
Rosetta Stone, Ltd. · 237,446 ratings · ★ 4.8
4.8
★★★★★
237,446 ratings
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Top complaints - extracted from 36 negative reviews
Recurring phrases mined from 1-2★ reviews. The bigger the percentage, the more users have the same problem. Fix the top 2-3 in your version and you have product-market fit on day one.
1
"subscription"
8 negative reviews mention this · 22% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Stealing from consumers. Do not trust Rosetta Stone. They have essentially stolen a product I paid $160 for in lieu of forcing a subscription upon me. Do not give money to this trash company" - bob grenson
2
"lifetime"
8 negative reviews mention this · 22% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Scam (bait and switch). They totally scammed me. I bought the lifetime membership just to have them discontinue improving this app and abandon it. Then rosetta stone makes another app (with the improvements I assumed I would be getting over the lifetime) just…" - Online app reviews
3
"language"
7 negative reviews mention this · 19% of all complaints
★★★★★ "For an app that checks pronunciation microphone interpretation matters. You can download the language keyboard you are learning and “speak to text” in that language and the correct word will register if your pronunciation is okay, but the app testing you won’t even register if a sound is occurring. Too expensiv…" - A. Forrester
4
"rosetta"
6 negative reviews mention this · 17% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Stealing from consumers. Do not trust Rosetta Stone. They have essentially stolen a product I paid $160 for in lieu of forcing a subscription upon me. Do not give money to this trash company" - bob grenson
5
"stone"
6 negative reviews mention this · 17% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Stealing from consumers. Do not trust Rosetta Stone. They have essentially stolen a product I paid $160 for in lieu of forcing a subscription upon me. Do not give money to this trash company" - bob grenson
6
"rosetta stone"
6 negative reviews mention this · 17% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Stealing from consumers. Do not trust Rosetta Stone. They have essentially stolen a product I paid $160 for in lieu of forcing a subscription upon me. Do not give money to this trash company" - bob grenson
7
"pictures"
6 negative reviews mention this · 17% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Too much guessing. Latin American Spanish: There are too many places where they are having you absolutely guess who or what they are talking or asking about. Is she/he looking at the camera or not… big difference in the answer. So much guesswork! Extremely fr…" - Shouldcookmore
8
"wrong"
5 negative reviews mention this · 14% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Too much guessing. Latin American Spanish: There are too many places where they are having you absolutely guess who or what they are talking or asking about. Is she/he looking at the camera or not… big difference in the answer. So much guesswork! Extremely fr…" - Shouldcookmore
9
"work"
5 negative reviews mention this · 14% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Too much guessing. Latin American Spanish: There are too many places where they are having you absolutely guess who or what they are talking or asking about. Is she/he looking at the camera or not… big difference in the answer. So much guesswork! Extremely fr…" - Shouldcookmore
10
"doesn"
5 negative reviews mention this · 14% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Audio is unusable. Doesn’t matter if I’m using the phone, external earbuds, external headphones, whatever. Audio quality claims it’s bad and the scoring is completely random. Saying the same word or fragment multiple times in the same way could be completely …" - User Matthew
11
"paid"
4 negative reviews mention this · 11% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Stealing from consumers. Do not trust Rosetta Stone. They have essentially stolen a product I paid $160 for in lieu of forcing a subscription upon me. Do not give money to this trash company" - bob grenson
12
"word"
4 negative reviews mention this · 11% of all complaints
★★★★★ "For an app that checks pronunciation microphone interpretation matters. You can download the language keyboard you are learning and “speak to text” in that language and the correct word will register if your pronunciation is okay, but the app testing you won’t even register if a sound is occurring. Too expensiv…" - A. Forrester
📋 All 36 negative reviews
Every 1-2★ review we fetched. Use the copy button to grab them all for your own analysis (paste into ChatGPT/Claude with a prompt like "summarize core user problems, group by theme, ignore bugs, focus on missing features").
Stealing from consumers
Do not trust Rosetta Stone. They have essentially stolen a product I paid $160 for in lieu of forcing a subscription upon me. Do not give money to this trash company
Scam (bait and switch)
They totally scammed me. I bought the lifetime membership just to have them discontinue improving this app and abandon it.
Then rosetta stone makes another app (with the improvements I assumed I would be getting over the lifetime) just to let this one they are pushing die on the vine. I heard their add on NPR.
I think NPR needs to do a piece on the scam rosetta stone is pulling on people
Then rosetta stone makes another app (with the improvements I assumed I would be getting over the lifetime) just to let this one they are pushing die on the vine. I heard their add on NPR.
I think NPR needs to do a piece on the scam rosetta stone is pulling on people
For an app that checks pronunciation microphone interpretation matters
You can download the language keyboard you are learning and “speak to text” in that language and the correct word will register if your pronunciation is okay, but the app testing you won’t even register if a sound is occurring. Too expensive to be this useless
Bricked my License
I paid over $500 for the permanent license to learn a language and now I can’t use it because you’re requiring a subscription fee. Don’t offer it if you won’t honor it.
Too much guessing
Latin American Spanish: There are too many places where they are having you absolutely guess who or what they are talking or asking about. Is she/he looking at the camera or not… big difference in the answer. So much guesswork! Extremely frustrating when you are trying to learn and are getting things wrong because they picked poor pictures.
Free from the library should have been my clue as to quality.
Free from the library should have been my clue as to quality.
Confusing learning
You’re app I feel does not give enough translation on what the sentences mean and you just use pictures, but pictures don’t always work.
Bad voice detection
Has trouble identifying that speech is occurring at all. This seems to occur more after the first few lessons. You can say anything but some questions will just be impassible because no matter what you say it acts as if you remained silent. Use in anechoic silent room or use something else. All other programs were off and this was a brand new fully updated iPhone that had been released months prior. Closing and restarting the app didn’t help.
Sapphire? Seriously?
So you improved and now offer what you claim is superior language instruction. But instead of giving it to all your loyal clients, you put the improvement into a completely separate app. And you want to charge a completely separate fee. That is a real underhanded tactic. If you're a language learner reading this and you're not subscribed to Rosetta Stone yet, let me give you some advice, don't!
bad
unhelpful, speech feature is practically random, don’t use this for students
Audio is unusable
Doesn’t matter if I’m using the phone, external earbuds, external headphones, whatever. Audio quality claims it’s bad and the scoring is completely random. Saying the same word or fragment multiple times in the same way could be completely right or completely wrong. Difficultly slider on speech doesn’t seem to help at all either.
False advertising
Do not pay for lifetime access with Rosetta Stone. They claim lifetime access, but it only applies to the current app. Almost as soon as I paid for lifetime access, they came out with a new app and the subscription doesn’t transfer. It’s obvious they’re stopping old app and it will be discontinued before the end of my life XD false advertising..
Lifetime Subscription, Not So Much!
I get that the lifetime subscription applies to the product. But releasing another app that will now receive upgrades that could have gone into this “classic” app and honoring those of us who bought lifetime subscriptions, would have shown customer value. If nothing else you could have grandfathered in the prior purchased lifetime subscriptions at the very least.
I am now suck with this “Classic” app that has suddenly locked all sections and is no longer accessible or usable. Do better.
I am now suck with this “Classic” app that has suddenly locked all sections and is no longer accessible or usable. Do better.
Impossible to cancel
Please be VERY careful. Its is nearly impossible to cancel the subscription. I’m about to open a can whoopass and claim three yrs of subscription back because you ignore my support emails and there is zero cancellation option in the app.
Bait & Switch Scam
Designers sold a Lifetime membership. I bought one. Now I cannot use it because the company created a new app version and disabled the previous one many
. Absolutely disgusting lack of ethics. How do you all live with yourselves?
. Absolutely disgusting lack of ethics. How do you all live with yourselves?
Doesn’t work
Speech recognition is trash. Costumer support never loads so you cannot get assistance. I regret buying it.
why did you exclude latin?
what is wrong with your organization?
Regret my purchase
Annoying and unhelpful app. Can’t even get my money back.
Audio problems makes app useless
Content is good but the app is finicky, images are thumbnail sized making identification hard and the audio (speaker and mic) so frustrating. I finally just gave up and moved on.
The new Sapphire version may be great but requiring purchase of a new version as a subscription after buying a “lifetime” is just wrong.
The new Sapphire version may be great but requiring purchase of a new version as a subscription after buying a “lifetime” is just wrong.
The Filipino has no English translation
Not recommended
Can Not Recommend
I’ve wanted Rosetta Stone for years and now, with an international move on the horizon, I’ve finally purchased it for both my daughter and I.
I have followed instructions, I use a wired headset in a quiet room with no background noise, I’ve adjusted settings, and the help I have received is asking what type of headset I am using and a list of suggestions that MIGHT make the app work that is so long they include a link to continue it.
So much of the program is built around speaking, it would be nice if it recognized, acknowledged, or in any way worked for speaking. I can get so far and then all of a sudden nothing. No way to move forward, no way to learn. But it’s me, apparently.
I paid for the full program twice. I want a refund for both as we are both having the same issue and we are not on the same devices. Whenever I attempt to go to billing where I can supposedly request a refund, the page doesn’t load.
Do not buy this unless you know without a doubt it will function for you. Which seems unlikely. This is more than glitchy this is a problem that needs to be fixed but they would rather tell you all the ways it’s your fault it doesn’t work, even if you make it through the list of ways to fix it.
I have followed instructions, I use a wired headset in a quiet room with no background noise, I’ve adjusted settings, and the help I have received is asking what type of headset I am using and a list of suggestions that MIGHT make the app work that is so long they include a link to continue it.
So much of the program is built around speaking, it would be nice if it recognized, acknowledged, or in any way worked for speaking. I can get so far and then all of a sudden nothing. No way to move forward, no way to learn. But it’s me, apparently.
I paid for the full program twice. I want a refund for both as we are both having the same issue and we are not on the same devices. Whenever I attempt to go to billing where I can supposedly request a refund, the page doesn’t load.
Do not buy this unless you know without a doubt it will function for you. Which seems unlikely. This is more than glitchy this is a problem that needs to be fixed but they would rather tell you all the ways it’s your fault it doesn’t work, even if you make it through the list of ways to fix it.
Why isn't Latin updated for mobile yet?
Hate that you pay lifetime fee and apparently don't get access to one of the languages on mobile, because they haven't ported it over yet? Had no issue taking that money ASAP though huh?
App is terrible
The app is constantly telling me my microphone on my brand new iPhone 17 is not good. And I am constantly yelling into the app to get it to understand anything. What a garbage POS this is. So glad I wasted $200 on a lifetime subscription to the junk
No Real Portuguese
The Portuguese they have on here is the Brazilian version which at this point in time I would’ve expected to actually have the real Portuguese version on here.
Good app
I like that the app is 100% in the language your learning from the beginning and uses pictures to translate. My only complaint is the price, which is fairly reasonable but still seems like a lot because it’s primarily subscription based (though they do offer a lifetime, pay once offer)
No portrait mode
App defaults to landscape orientation and some options always drop below the visible area on the screen. Sometimes images within boxes are too small. The app seems to have buggy graphics. Lessons get stuck and will not advance and keeps repeating one part of the lesson.
No translation
It’s on foreign language and pictures. You have no idea what the pictures mean. It would be nice if had both languages listed.
Rosetta Stone Review
I hate it when I was trying to learn Tagalog it would say the word in Tagalong and never tell me what it means I had to guess the whole time I would love it if they told me the word in English then in Tagalog as well as put them side by side. Also on the saying the word in Tagalog I could not get it I did not understand if it was because I don’t have an accent so I would like that to be explained to me.
No Bengali??
The 7th most spoken language on earth is not included?!
Login doesn’t work
Logged in on browser with the same email/pw but the mobile app will not sign in. Feels like an important part of your app you shouldn’t let break but that’s just me what do I know
Annoying
I spoke perfectly but it wouldn’t hear it and then when I didn’t say anything it said it was poor
Eh ok
It is very easy to understand but sometimes confusing but I like it it’s my opinion boo boo
Terrible audio listener
It’s literally terrible even when I’m pronouncing the sentence exactly like the speaker and even in the same tone to try to fix it , it says I’m wrong. Highly frustrating and it needs to be fix immediately
Meh
So far, I’ve identified two big problems with this app. It uses minuscule photos in which you must identify the object being referred to. The pictures are hard to see. I’m quite frustrated with this aspect of the program. The second and VERY BIG problem is that, although there is a place to leave feedback, it won’t actually allow you to do so. Frankly, I’m ready to ask for a refund.
Overpriced
I want me auto and speaking. I don’t read everything. I don’t know how this is better that Duolingo or other language apps. I must be missing something. When I am going through the core classes, where do I get the English translation?
Glitchy
Wish that i could do it on my computer. It is very glitchy on my phone. Most of the time when you tap to see what it says, it just stops working all together. Also the pictures are not always obvious what it is.
Repeating Words
I am saying the word properly, as a matter of fact I’ve said it 69 times , but the lesson refuses to move on.
Some words work perfectly others refuse to accept. I even had a native German speaker try it and they got as frustrated as me
Some words work perfectly others refuse to accept. I even had a native German speaker try it and they got as frustrated as me
Sentiment summary
96%
Positive (4-5★)
2%
Neutral (3★)
2%
Negative (1-2★)