The Fastest Way to Learn Yoruba in 2026

The fastest way to learn Yoruba is to spend most of your study time on Yoruba you can mostly understand. That kind of Yoruba is called comprehensible input.

Find the level that sounds like you. Its bar shows how to spend an hour of study.

1. Level 1

   I'm just starting out or know only a few words.

   • Read and listen 35 min
   • Review 15 min
   • Speak 10 min

   Choose one of two ways to start. The easiest way is Bubblegum, where Poppy, your AI tutor, writes short Yoruba lessons at your level about your interests and goals and explains the grammar as you go. The other way is a textbook. Get Colloquial Yoruba and work through one unit at a time, reading each dialogue while you play its free audio from the Routledge website. Plan on a few weeks of hard study to learn the basic grammar before you start using apps.

   • Textbook: Colloquial Yoruba
   • Free audio for the textbook
2. Level 2

   I can read simple sentences.

   • Read and listen 40 min
   • Review 10 min
   • Speak 10 min

   If you use Bubblegum, read its Level 2 lessons with the translation hidden, and look up only the words that stop you. If you use a textbook, try Yorùbá Yé Mi, a free textbook with audio, because Colloquial Yoruba has no second book. Also read a Level 1 story on Storybooks Nigeria.

   • Yorùbá Yé Mi
   • Storybooks Nigeria
3. Level 3

   I can read short stories and messages.

   • Read and listen 40 min
   • Review 5 min
   • Speak 15 min

   At this level you need more words, so read and listen a lot. Bubblegum reuses the words you saved in new Level 3 lessons. Also read the Level 2 and Level 3 stories on Storybooks Nigeria, and spend 15 minutes talking with a tutor about what you read.

   • Storybooks Nigeria
   • italki's Yoruba tutors
4. Level 4

   I can read longer texts about everyday life.

   • Read and watch 45 min
   • Review 5 min
   • Speak 10 min

   Read Bubblegum lessons at Level 4 to learn more words. Then read Yoruba Wikipedia articles about things you like, and read a news report on BBC News Yorùbá about something you already read in English.

   • Yoruba Wikipedia
   • BBC News Yorùbá
5. Level 5

   I can follow complex topics, but miss some details.

   • Read and watch 50 min
   • Speak 10 min

   Read Bubblegum lessons at Level 5, and read longer reports on BBC News Yorùbá and watch its videos. Look up only the words that stop you.

   • BBC News Yorùbá
   • Preply's Yoruba tutors
6. Level 6

   I can read almost anything.

   • Read and watch 50 min
   • Speak 10 min

   Read Yoruba novels, such as D. O. Fágúnwà's Ògbójú Ọdẹ nínú Igbó Irúnmọlẹ̀ from 1938, and talk about what you read. Poppy can write your Level 6 lessons about anything you're into.

   • Fágúnwà's first Yoruba novel
   • BBC News Yorùbá

Move up a level when your lessons start to feel easy, and move back down if you can't tell what's happening by the third line.

The U.S. Foreign Service Institute does not list Yoruba on its language training page, so it gives no hours for it. The SOAS Language Centre in London teaches Yoruba in three beginners levels. Each level is one 10-week term with 20 hours: 15 hours of online lessons with a teacher and at least 5 hours of guided study on your own. Beginners 1 covers the alphabet, syllables, tone marks and basic verbs, greetings, numbers and ordering food. Beginners 2 adds reading passages, including folktales and BBC News Yorùbá. Here is how long those 20 and 60 hours take at different amounts of study a week:

These are course hours, so treat them as a rough guide. The calendar time of a real course is longer, and the table does not promise that you will reach a level in that time.

• 🎵Tones Read From Text AloneA different tone gives a different word: ọkọ́ is a hoe, ọkọ is a husband, ọkọ̀ is a vehicle and ọ̀kọ̀ is a spear. Play the audio for each new word, so the sound and the spelling stay together.
• 🔤Dots Left OutThe letters ẹ, ọ and ṣ have dots, and they are separate letters from e, o and s. Learn each word with its dots, and remember that gb is one letter.
• 👂Waiting to ListenTextbook dialogues and BBC News Yorùbá videos let you hear Yoruba from the start. Listen to a dialogue before you read it, and play it again when you can follow it.