Babbel. Has anyone used this successfully?

I haven't used Babble, but I've been subscribing to Rosetta Stone for a little over a year. I could be wrong, but I think Babble and Rosetta Stone are pretty similar.

I've been studying French. I think Rosetta Stone has been very helpful. It's definitely geared towards speaking the language rather than reading and writing.

I have a friend who teaches an informal adult French class which meets once a week at a restaurant. She has taught in a college setting for years. She gives us homework, etc. Between the French class and Rosetta Stone, I feel like I've gotten to the point where I could have a very slow conversation w/ a patient French person. One of my goals is to be able to read some classic French novels in French. I feel like that goal is very doable.

If nothing else, I've had a lot of fun studying French and I think it's been good for my mind.

I had looked into Duolingo and Babbel for my girls to learn a new language, but then found out my library lets us access Rosetta Stone for free.  That won out. ^.^  

So far, my oldest DD has been learning French and youngest started Japanese over the summer.  It bookmarks where they are, so if they don't want to finish a lesson, they can pick it up later.  

I live in a NATO community with 30 nationalities, in the French part of Belgium. Probably at least half of the locals do not speak English. Duolingo is very, very popular to learn French and English (formal languages of NATO). I've been taking French classes at a school in town and Duolingo is a great way to practice. But what I really, really love are their podcasts. It's half in French and half in English. They are really interesting, informative, and made a BIG difference in my listening comprehension.

I'd try the free version if you are doing this to keep your mind engaged. If you don't like it, then you could try a paying app. The podcasts, however, are free.

DS used Duolingo for extra practice when he was taking French in HS. He liked the format and it was easy to use.

It definitely uses another part of your brain that I obviously need to exercise.  I'm in my mid-50s and French does not come naturally to me; certainly not like it did in HS or college.  I'm fine with the vocabulary and ok with the conjugations, but putting sentences together quickly is a struggle.  I tend to fixate on the word that I don't know, but my teacher was very good about us practicing that and coming up with alternate words.

Ooh, that's neat.  I check ours and they don't have anything like that, which surprises me because they do offer access to many other educational/learning sites, plus they have foreign language get-togethers and a section of books in languages other than English as well.  So I think I may make the suggestion.  Thanks for the idea!

I haven't used Babbel, but I've been using Duolingo for awhile now. You can put the app on your phone and do it from there or use your laptop/desktop. If you use the phone app you will have ads and you get "lives" -- those are hearts and you lose one for every mistake you make on new lessons. Which is totally stupid in my opinion... I mean, you're learning a new language and you're typing on a phone so of course you're going to make mistakes. However, it doesn't deduct lives if you make a mistake on any review lessons you do for units you've completed.

On the desktop version there are no ads if you have an adblocker and there are no "lives". 

So what I do is do most of it on my laptop, but I use the phone app for reviewing completed lessons in bed. Also, you can speak your answers on the phone which you can't do on the desktop. 

If you use Duolingo you also need to have some sort of book... I bought one of those "painless Spanish" books.. You just need something that has grammar so when you're confused by Duolingo's explanation you can look it up. Of course you could also just look it up online but I like having a book open next to me. 

I also make flash cards for things like confusing verb tenses, irregular verbs, or words that I CANNOT keep straight in my mind. 

I've learned a lot and I find now that I can often understand what people are saying around me which is fun. Just today in fact dd and I were in Michael's and the poor lone cashier called out to another employee and said "donde esta Gloria?" and the other person replied "esta viniendo". Not very complicated Spanish but I'm please that I could understand the words without thinking about it.  

eta: As others have said, you can pay for Duolingo which will remove the ads on your phone, and it gives you some other exercises I think. Every once in awhile, when you get to a certain streak, Duo will offer you a few days of free premium. The only thing different I've noticed is the ability to do lessons that review only the mistakes you've made. I like that but not enough to pay for it. lol. There may be other things that paying gets you but I don't know what they are.