Arabic immersion is a great way to speed up the language learning process and to make it more enjoyable. Today you will learn how to immerse yourself in Arabic using popular websites and apps.
In this post, we’ll not only give you ideas, but we will also share our suggestions and links to different types of content that will help you develop your Arabic skills.
You can find a huge amount of Arabic language content on the Internet, all of which you can use to learn. We encourage you to start the immersion process right from the beginning, even if you barely speak Arabic.
Table of Contents:
Arabic immersion with Podcasts
Podcasts are a great and fun way to learn a language. It’s best to find podcasts whose topics interest you. Podcasts can be listened to while doing other activities (cleaning, cooking, driving), so it’s a great option for people who don’t have a lot of time to learn a language on a daily basis.
By listening to podcasts even in the background, you can consolidate the knowledge you have already acquired. Podcast episodes are usually focused on a single topic, and this makes it much easier to learn vocabulary.
If you listen for half an hour or even longer to conversation/lecture on one topic, there is a good chance that you will remember a lot of new vocabulary, as well as phrases relating to that topic.
Podcasts in Arabic can be found in both Modern Standard Arabic and Arabic dialects.
There are some great podcasts for Arabic language learners, but this is a post about immersion, so below we recommend three podcasts in Arabic for native speakers:
- Mstdfr (Arabic: مِستَدفِر) a weekly Middle Eastern geeky podcast spoken in “Arablish”. Ammar & Rami host different guests to Discuss, Debate & Diffuse various topics including: Science, culture, tech, Entertainment & new generation challenges.
- Nouf Hakim is an entrepreneur and self-healing speaker, who talks in her podcast episodes about human relationships, healing, and self-love.
- 1,001 Nights is an Arabic fiction podcast that recounts the classic Arabian folk tales. The magical stories centre around the infamous characters of ruler Shahryar and his wife Shahrezade across 15 episodes.
TIP: You can find more podcasts by writing the word بودكاست or بودكاست عربي / بودكاست بالعربي in google search or even YouTube. If you are searching for a podcast from a specific country just add country name and you should easily find it.
Immerse yourself in Arabic with Youtube
Probably the most popular way to immerse yourself in Arabic is to watch YouTube videos in Arabic. There are rarely English subtitles available for YouTube videos in Arabic, but that’s even better for you! This way, you will be somewhat forced to try to understand Arabic words and phrases out of context.
On YouTube you will certainly find videos on every possible topic, so there is no problem finding something that you may like. Here are some suggestions:
Vlogs
If you are learning a dialect try to find some person/family who runs a vlog channel. There are many advantages to watching vlogs in the language you are learning, but the main advantage is that the vocabulary is repeatable, and that you learn words and expressions that are useful in everyday life.
An additional advantage is that it’s easy to find YouTubers speaking probably every possible dialect of Arabic. Below are a few vlog channels in Arabic examples:
- Siamand & Shahad – family content
- Maha Vlogs – vlogs
Cooking channels
Almost everyone checks recipes online. So why not do it in Arabic? In Arabic you will not only find Middle Eastern cuisine recipes, but also other recipes.
As an example check out Spaghetti recipe in Arabic. Whenever you are about to cook a new dish, search for it first in Arabic.
We can guarantee that after a few such videos you will know most of the vocabulary for food and cooking.
Cooking channels in Arabic examples:
Knowledge channels
You will also find many channels on YouTube with useful or interesting information. Such channels are most often in Modern Standard Arabic, so this is good news for those who are learning MSA. In this case, you can choose from a huge range of topics: technology, psychology, history, religion, sports, etc.
Some examples:
- متع عقلك | حقائق – “Your guide to all that is new, distinctive and strange”
- مفتاح الفكر – “Comprehensive channel through which we try to develop thought through various useful and sometimes funny videos”
- هل تعلم؟ – “A general culture channel, the largest social and cultural network on YouTube, concerned with the fields of culture, public health, and everything new in the world of technology”
Arabic immersion – Chats
The most important thing in learning a language is to communicate with another person. If you don’t want to, or can’t at the moment, buy lessons with a teacher, you can start with registering on apps where you can speak with native speakers for free.
There are many language exchange apps out there, but it is quite difficult to find a committed language partner who can really help you learn the language. However, it is worth trying these apps or websites from time to time to talk or chat with a native speaker.
You can start talking to native speakers for free by registering at Conversation Exchange website.
Arabic immersion with Twitter
Especially for beginners, reading long texts can be quite tiring. You don’t have to read books right away to improve your skills.
Short written forms and an easy translation option make Twitter (now X) seem like a perfect tool to give you your daily dose of Arabic.
You don’t have to be advanced in the language to learn with Twitter. You can do it even as a beginner, here is how:
- if you can’t read the whole tweet, use the translation option
- check what the keyword of the whole information is: for example, if the tweet talks about a hurricane in USA, the keyword of the whole message will be the word hurricane, this is the most important word you should learn from this text
- write this word down in your notebook. In this way you learn a new word more easily, because the whole procedure makes the word already associated with something and it is not just a word from the list in your old notebook. Most often we associate new words with specific events – where or when we heard/read the word
- by sharing or liking a tweet, you can also find it later on your account, so you can easily return to the selected content if you want to read the same text several times
Of course, advanced learners will benefit the most from learning a language on Twitter. Reading texts in Arabic every day will in itself make you better and better at it. However, even advanced learners can learn in a more structured way:
- read without using the translation option
- only look up words you don’t know at all, or try to guess the words meaning from context and then look them up in a dictionary to make sure
- engage in discussion with other users
- publish your own tweets in Arabic (create a separate account just for learning the language if you don’t want to mix content on your personal account)
- pay attention to the grammatical structures used in the text
Keeping a diary in Arabic
If you want to improve your Arabic writing skills a great idea would be to keep a diary. Start with short texts- a few sentences about how your day was, what you are planning for tomorrow, etc.
After a while, writing will become easier and you will be able to write longer texts.
TIP: Sometimes you may lack the motivation to learn. It is very popular these days to keep such diaries online. You can set up a free blog, an Instagram account, a YouTube channel, a Twitter account or whatever you prefer and publish short statements in Arabic there.
This way you can find people who are learning the same language, but also native speakers who are willing to help you and correct eventual mistakes. Who knows, maybe you will attract a large audience?
Arabic immersion with series
Watching series in Arabic is undoubtedly one of the most enjoyable ways to learn the language. Although this task may seem overwhelming at first, after a while you will notice how much it develops your Arabic language skills.
TIP: There is already a post on our website about learning from Arabic series. In this post you will find about 40 suggestions for Arabic series to watch for free on YouTube. Start watching Arabic series today!
Language immersion chrome extensions
An interesting way to learn a language are chrome extensions for language immersion.
Check out the following post for an overview of the options available: 11 Chrome Extensions All Language Self-Learners Need To Know About.
Read Wikipedia in Arabic
Who doesn’t use Wikipedia these days? When you want to look something up on Wikipedia, try doing it in Arabic first. Of course, if you are a beginner you don’t have to read whole, long articles straight away. One or two short paragraphs will be great.
Try this exercise once in a while and you will see how much it will help develop your Arabic reading skills.
If you are learning Egyptian Arabic or darija we have a great news for you- there are many Wikipedia articles in Egyptian Arabic and in darija.
TIP: read only Wikipedia articles that interest you, or only articles that you need at the moment. This will create a context that will help you remember new vocabulary much more quickly and easily.
If you don’t know the Arabic alphabet yet check our post Arabic alphabet – All you need to know to write in Arabic
Arabic immersion- Pinterest
Pinterest is a great place to learn a language. Not only can you find learning materials dedicated for Arabic learners, but also a huge amount of great, authentic content for native speakers.
You can find literally everything on Pinterest:
- reading (interesting infographics)
- listening (short videos)
- humor (memes)
- Arabic vocabulary
- quotes in Arabic
We have created Arabic reading board on our Pinterest account where we save short, easy texts in Arabic. By following our board, you can read a very short text in Arabic every day, which in the long run brings amazing results.
We also have a board where we post memes in Arabic:
See our post learning Levantine Arabic with memes as an example of how you can learn Arabic from Pinterest.
Social Media: Facebook, Instagram, snapchat etc.
Follow a couple of influencers/accounts on your social media who post content that you may like in Arabic.
It doesn’t matter if it’s an influencer on Instagram or a fanpage on Facebook. What matters is that at least some content in the language you are learning, appears on your feed every day.
This is the kind of learning that requires literally no effort from you.
Summary
People learn languages in order to use them-in turn, using them greatly accelerates the language learning process.
Don’t waste your time and get started today!
