Duo is social, a great communicator, and rather emotional. The shame is real…and very effective for open rates and retention.

He’s like a parent: you never want to disappoint Duo.

Duo isn’t shy about checking in or laying on a guilt trip. He’s their #1 fan and biggest cheerleader. The only thing he loves more than Duolingo is seeing our learners succeed. For some users, gamification, badges, community leader boards that encourage competition, and daily stakes are enough for them to keep using the app.ĭuo is our mascot. For some time, I decided to use only the desktop version and minimize distractions while learning. At one point, it got annoying, and I decided to have the app only when I am consistently studying since all the overall progress is saved to my profile anyways.

It was great when I was in a flow of learning and managing to do my daily stakes (in-app metrics for success and progress), but whenever I missed a lesson or two, the push notifications would pile up on my screen one after another. Having my profile since 2015, Duolingo was the application I had on and off in my phone app library. The disappointment in his eyes when you don’t finish your daily lesson.

The duolingo owl