Many Russian learners stall in the same place. They learn the Cyrillic alphabet and study tables of noun endings, and they still can't follow two friends ordering coffee. Russian has six cases, so the end of a noun changes with its job in the sentence. Endings learned from tables don't turn into understanding on their own. Comprehensible input is the fix: you spend the same study time on Russian where you already know almost every word, so the few new ones explain themselves.
What Comprehensible Input Looks Like
Each row below is a sentence. The gray bars are words you already know, and the purple bar is the one that is new.
About one new word per sentence.
At this difficulty you keep reading, because everything around the new word tells you what it means. You work it out yourself, and a word learned that way stays with you far longer than one memorized from a list.
Your Roadmap by Level
Bubblegum sorts every lesson into six levels, and each level is described by a sentence about the learner. Find the sentence that sounds like you, and the row tells you what to read and what to do.
- Absolute Beginner
I can't read Cyrillic yet.
The Russian alphabet has 33 letters, and a few of them, such as А, К, and М, already look and sound like English letters. Start with the free Russian Cyrillic course, which teaches all of them in nine short chapters.
Russian Cyrillic course - Level 1
I can sound out words but not much else.
Read short dialogues that come with audio and a translation, and save the three words you look up most often. Comprehensible Russian and Random Russian also have free videos on YouTube for complete beginners.
Level 1 lessons about ordering coffee - Level 2
I can read simple sentences.
Read dialogues about topics you care about with the translation hidden, and look up only the words that stop you. Sergey Storyteller tells easy stories in Russian on YouTube.
Level 2 lessons about ordering coffee - Level 3
I can read short stories and messages.
Add the free episodes of the Comprehensible Russian Podcast from Russian with Max, and listen to each lesson once more without reading along.
Level 3 lessons about ordering coffee - Level 4
I can read longer texts about everyday life.
Watch Easy Russian, where people on the street in Russian cities answer questions, and keep the Russian subtitles on.
Level 4 lessons about ordering coffee - Level 5
I can follow complex topics, but miss some details.
Read and watch the free news on BBC News Russian and DW in Russian, and look up only the words that block the story.
- Level 6
I can follow detailed arguments and different writing styles.
Read novels and long essays for their own sake.
Move up a level when the current one starts to feel easy, and move back down if you lose the thread by the third line.
Try It on a Real Lesson
The lesson below comes from Bubblegum, where Poppy, your AI tutor, writes Russian lessons at your level. You can read it here just as you would in the app. Read it at all three levels and notice which one you can follow while still looking up a few words.
One Situation, Three Levels
From Bubblegum’s guide Ordering Coffee and Interacting at a Russian Cafe. It works here the way it works inside Bubblegum.
I can handle simple exchanges.
☕️ Meeting at a cafe
The friends met at a café yesterday.
I arrived early in the morning.
And I didn't buy coffee (female speaker).
We drank tea together.
It was very cozy.
Frequently Asked Questions About Comprehensible Input
Do I need to learn the cases first?
No. In Это книга (This is a book), the book is книга, and in Я читаю книгу (I'm reading a book), it is книгу. You learn which ending goes where by meeting each one many times in sentences you understand.
How do I know which syllable to stress?
Everyday Russian text doesn't mark stress, so check a dictionary until you get a feel for it. Stress can change what a word means: за́мок (castle) and замо́к (lock) differ only in the stressed syllable. OpenRussian is a free dictionary that shows the stress on every word.
Is Bubblegum free?
Yes. The lesson library is free for everyone, because we believe everyone should be able to learn. It holds lessons that other learners asked Poppy for. A new custom lesson costs us real money to make, so you can ask Poppy for a free one, and Bubblegum Pro gives you unlimited custom lessons.
The Russian Cyrillic course and the Russian lessons on this site are also free and need no account.
