My Duolingo streak just passed 1102 days. That’s three years of daily Norwegian practice without breaking the chain (with some help from streak freezes though). As with every app nowadays, Duolingo provided me with a 2025 review.
The Numbers
According to Duolingo, I’m now a “top 9% learner.” That surprised me. I do exactly one lesson per day, nothing more. But I suppose most people aren’t consistent, and consistency is what Duolingo rewards.
Here’s what my 2025 looked like:
- 1,074-day streak
- 969 minutes spent (roughly 2.6 minutes per day)
- 10,732 XP earned
- Norwegian Score: 31
16 Hours of Learning; Is It Worth It?
When you frame it as “16 hours across an entire year,” it sounds almost insignificant. But here’s the thing: it’s 16 hours I wouldn’t have spent otherwise. And for that minimal investment, my vocabulary has genuinely expanded.
I‘ve written before about whether Duolingo is actually worth it for learning Norwegian. My conclusion after 900 days was that it’s a helpful supplement but not a complete solution. That still holds true.
What’s changed since then is that I’m now also taking a formal Norwegian course. Duolingo complements it well, sometimes covering vocabulary my course doesn’t touch, and other times providing useful repetition of words I’ve already encountered. For someone fully immersed in Norwegian life, it’s hard to isolate exactly how much Duolingo contributes. But I’d argue that for 16 hours of effort spread across a year, I’ve learned quite a bit.
The Strangest Sentences of 2025
One thing that hasn’t changed: Duolingo’s sentences remain delightfully absurd. I’ve been collecting screenshots throughout the year, and here are my favourites from 2025:
Hvorfor er det en svensk telefonselger i sengen min?: Why is there a Swedish telemarketer in my bed?
Liker du føtter? : Do you like feet?
Han hadde skitne tallerkener under sengen: He had dirty plates under the bed.
Bjørnen har et møte med laksen: The bear has a meeting with the salmon.
Hun tilbød ham et hus og tolv barn: She offered him a house and twelve children.
Tærne mine liker ikke sko: My toes don’t like shoes.
Will I ever use these sentences in real life? Probably not. But I’ll certainly remember them.
Three Years In: What I’ve Learned About Learning
The streak itself is worth celebrating, though I try not to obsess over it. There were definitely days where I did a single lesson just to keep the number alive, not because I was genuinely engaged. That’s fine. Consistency doesn’t require enthusiasm every single day.
The real lesson from three years of Duolingo is simple: small efforts compound. 2.6 minutes per day doesn’t sound like much, but it adds up to genuine vocabulary growth over time. It won’t make you fluent, but it will make you slightly better and for limited effort, that’s a good trade.
If you want a deeper dive into whether Duolingo actually helps with Norwegian, check out my post on 900 Days of Duolingo Norwegian. And if you’ve encountered any strange sentences yourself, I’d love to hear them in the comments.
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