Nglish is an Appy Award winner English-Spanish translation app by Britannica & Merriam Webster that can also teach English or teach Spanish to its users. There are preparation tools that can help students pass ESL, EFL, TOEFL, and TOEIC tests as well as a new word each day to help regularly extend people’s vocabularies. Nglish goes both ways and can help people learn either English or Spanish, and users can change the entire interface language from the settings as well. Perhaps you have Spanish-speaking relatives, maybe you’re looking to brush up on your English skills? Whatever it is, it looks like Nglish is a complete English-Spanish solution. Let’s find out, shall we?
First thing’s first, you’ll need to download Nglish from the Play Store to get started. You can also use Nglish online as well.
Right away you can see that Nglish has a little bit of everything on offer when it comes to helping people either translate or learn English or Spanish. One of the bigger reasons someone might need to have an app like this is to be able to translate or look up words on the move.
This works really well, and it also auto-completes words in both English as well as Spanish. So, for instance if you’re a Spanish user who wants to use the app in Spanish, you just need to head to the settings to make the change.
Regardless however, of which language you have the interface in, Nglish will auto-complete words in both English and Spanish, which makes finding a word in any language, especially if you’re unsure of the spelling, nice and simple.
Whenever you get translation results, tapping on the orange words delivers a little more information, useful for more advanced speakers wishing to learn more. Here, you can tap the star to add it to your favorites list, essentially adding it to your own personal quiz, thus helping you learn a word and its meaning over time.
Learning how to speak Spanish, or English, is a big part of Nglish. I was eager to try this out, as I spent many years at school learning how to speak Spanish. That was some time ago, so I was keen to see how my memory had lasted over the years.
I chose the Intermediate option, as you can see Nglish gives users an idea of what sorts of words to expect which is nice.
On my first run through, I didn’t do all that well, but that’s okay, if you sign up for a free account with Nglish, you can save words that you’ve found tricky in past attempts. This is a key feature for those that wish to better either their English or their Spanish skills. Words and phrases that you have gotten wrong in previous games are automatically logged, and you can use the Personal zone to work on these words to better yourself.
In this personal zone is where you will find the “My Words” section, as noted above words that have been starred will appear here, ready for you to test your brain and perfect your skills.
A key feature here as well, is the ability to translate either English or Spanish text by highlighting it and sharing it with the Nglish app. So, let’s say you’re on holiday in England, looking at a restaurant’s website you see a confusing and tricky phrase:
Once you share it with Nglish, you’ll be given a translation in either English or Spanish.
All of these features come together to offer English or Spanish speakers a way to become familiar with the other language. More than just a glorified Spanish dictionary, Nglish can be used to learn either English or Spanish, and it’s a great tool for tourists and those with family members in Spanish or English-speaking countries.
When I studied Spanish at school, I wish I had something like this to help me through revision as well as looking up more difficult words and phrases. For students, this sort of thing is a nice way of offering them both a dictionary at their disposal wherever, whenever, but the preparation quizzes are a good way of keeping new content fresh in their mind. Being able to translate directly from a page on the web is a nice touch, and so too is the ability to completely change the interface language from Spanish to English and back again. It’s free, with ads to contend with, but those that really want to learn or take advantage of such a good tool will love to create an account and take better advantage of what’s on offer.
Ratings
- Speed (4/5) – Nglish is nice and quick, it opens quickly and it translates phrases and such nice and smoothly.
- Theme (4/5) – Nglish looks good, but an update to a more modern look and feel would be nice, especially for those running the latest versions of Android, but this won’t look out of place on any device.
- Features (4.5/5) – It might only be for English and Spanish, but the features in Nglish might not be new, but they’re easy to use and serve a real need. It’s better than Google Translate and the learning tools can genuinely improve your English or Spanish abilities for free.
Pros
- Works well on lower-end devices as well as higher-end pieces of hardware.
- Interface language change makes this truly bi-lingual for English and Spanish users.
- Allows users to translate content from any app or website using the share feature, something a lot of others don’t offer.
- Preparation skills reinforce and introduce speakers to new vocabulary while keeping their brains sharp for tests etc.
Cons
- Sharing content with Nglish to translate it doesn’t work with larger pieces of text, sadly.
- Ads can be a little offputting at times.
Despite the fact that Nglish is something that only English and Spanish speakers can take advantage of, there’s a lot on offer here. There’s also a similar app for Arabic available, as well. It can help people while on holiday, looking to do better in class or just help those looking to learn a new language. Many of us know someone who speaks Spanish or have family overseas, so it makes sense that these two languages are put together, and it’s a good job that Nglish is such a versatile offering.