Russian vs Polish: which should you learn?

Estimates for a native English speaker, following the US Foreign Service Institute’s groupings. Languages the Institute does not rank are placed beside their closest relatives. Your own pace will differ.

• You want reach across a large region and a start on other Slavic languages.
• You will use it in Russia and much of Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

Watch out for: cases and verb aspect, though the alphabet takes only days.

• You want the largest Slavic language in the European Union and a base for Czech and Slovak.
• You will use it in Poland and Polish communities across Europe and North America.
• You want to read from day one, since Polish uses the alphabet you already know.

Watch out for: seven cases and heavy consonant clusters.

Russian. Takes time. The alphabet is a weekend job. Cases and verb forms are the long part, which is why short, whole sentences work better than lists of endings.

Polish. Takes time for English speakers. There are seven cases and demanding consonant clusters. Short, repeatable sentences make it manageable.

In both, the quickest fix for pronunciation is the same: hear a whole sentence, say it out loud and check how close you were. That is the loop 4ToSpeak runs on every sentence.

Russian and Polish are close relatives, so a lot carries over. Learn one, and the second takes noticeably fewer hours than starting from scratch. Start with whichever you will use sooner.

If you cannot decide, start both for a week at 15 minutes a day. After seven days you will know which one you look forward to, and motivation matters more than the difference in hours.

Start Russian or start Polish, both free with no card.

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