If you have a trip coming up and you’re wondering how you can quickly learn a language for travel so you can survive from the moment you touch down, I have 10 language tricks you really need to know!
I’m Olly Richards and I've escaped being the clueless tourist! I've learned 8 languages and I've lived in 10 different countries. I've even written language learning books that have sold over a million copies!
And I've snagged the best language tricks for travellers along the way. So let's discover them together in this post.
Pro Tip
By the way, if you want to learn a new language fast, my top recommendation is StoryLearning®, a fun and effective method that gets you fluent thanks to stories, not rules. Find out more and claim your free 7-day trial of the course of your choice.
If you prefer watching videos to reading, hit play on the video version of this post at the top of the page. Otherwise, keep scrolling to discover ten tips that will help you learn a language for travel fast.
Table of Contents
#1 Get A Good Travel-Focused Phrasebook
Textbooks get a bad rap in the polyglot world. But one designed for travellers can be useful for absolute beginners, since someone has already gone to the trouble of putting together the most useful words and phrases.
And I’m not talking about grammar books.
Get one focused on travel and daily situations, especially if it has dialogues with audio recordings.
This is not an in depth study course, it’s a quick-fix.
You’re flying soon, and a phrasebook like this will have everything you need for daily interactions…
- Hello, how are you doing?
- Can I see the cocktail list please? (My personal favourite!)
Here’s what you do:
Pick out the most useful words and phrases, highlight them, learn them and listen to the audios.
What are useful phrases? Well, this is all about you, so anything relevant to your journey.
Don’t try to learn everything in the book!
A good trick is to imagine yourself actually there, in Paris or wherever, asking a stranger for a specific thing you want. How would you strike up the conversation?
- Where’s the best place to find almond croissants?
- Is there a pharmacy around here?
Usually there are little dialogues for practical situations, like riding in a taxi, getting directions, making friends. Pick the ones relevant for you.
And if you’re working on-the-go, learn anything related to that, like “What’s the wifi password?”
Scout around for phrase lists online, too.
Come to think of it, there’s a tonne of travel phrases on this blog like:
And many more!
#2 Focus On Listening Skills
A lot of people are so focused on learning what to say, that they forget they’ll need to understand what people say back to them.
Trust me, it’s going to be a daily thing –
- Do you want to pay by cash or credit card?
- You’re going in the wrong direction, it’s THAT way
So before you leave, get as good as you can at understanding what you’re hearing. How?
You just need some authentic audios.
If your phrase book came with an audio version, practise listening to the dialogues over and over until you understand them easily – questions and responses.
If you can find a bunch of audios from the exact region you're going to, even better as the vocabulary and even grammar can vary. Check out the differences below between Spanish from Guatemala and Argentina to see what I mean.
Don’t feel like you have to stick to the travel book. But there’s one tricky thing to prepare yourself for.
The way people really say things can be quite different from what you've learned. And if this happens, you might get confused and not understand.
You know how people are – we use contractions, we use slang, or just lazy speech!
So try this: find someone like a travel vlogger or a teacher to watch and imitate. Wikitongues is quite cool, too, because you can hear ordinary people describing themselves.
There’s often an English transcript with these, which is great. But the whole idea is just to hear how the language flows in real life.
And you want to hear them speaking fast too. Some of my tips are going to be useless if you only listen to slow audio and can only catch words at half speed. Nobody's going to speak in slow motion for you, I’m afraid!
#3 Memorise Useful Words And Phrases
So you’ve taken care of the understanding part…what next?
There are certain very predictable things that you can prepare for, because you know yourself so well. And you can memorise the exact things you’ll probably want to say.
This is where you double down on those highlighted lines in your phrase book.
You’re choosing very specific lines that work for you, and you’re going to memorise them.
And listen, there’s no reason not to make your own list of useful personalised phrases from other sources – YouTube can be an amazing resource!
Say you’re allergic to something – you definitely want to memorise that one!
And then make yourself some flashcards to practise with. Use whatever method works for you – Anki, handmade cards. It doesn't have to be complicated, as long as you understand.
That’s part one.
Part two is when you arrive at your destination.
Now you want to immerse yourself fully, because this can be the beginning of your best learning!
Think about it.
Just about everything you see in the new country is going to be written in this language.
Maybe you’ll see English translations here and there, but most texts will be in the local language.
So here’s a strategy:
First, make it a habit to read every bit of text you see: road signs, street names, menus, posters for shows, and so on.
This will get you in the habit of recognising common ways of putting things.
And listen to people around you. Yep – this is me telling you to eavesdrop!
It might sound funny, but as long as you’re being respectful, you can learn a lot from people’s conversations.
How the locals express themselves, what kind of interjections they use, different ways to say the same thing…
And you can even memorise their intonation.
Then you can practise adjusting and thinking on your feet.
Oh – and definitely practise asking someone to repeat and explain more slowly – you’re going to use that one a lot!
If you memorise these things before you need them, you’ll feel a lot more confident.
#4 Get Daily Speaking Practice
Okay, are you guys listening? You can’t skip the speaking!
You need as much speaking practice as you can get before the big day so you won't be scared.
This can be hard if you’re leaving soon and working a full-time job!
So do the two most efficient things:
First, spend 5 minutes a day speaking to yourself. Every day. Just get comfortable talking about your own life. This will help you beat the fear villain.
Then, go on a tutoring site like LanguaTalk and book a few sessions for daily speaking practice.
10 sessions would be great, if you can – it is so easy, and honestly, LanguaTalk is my favourite place to go for this.
They’re very chilled teachers – you can ask them to help you practise specific scenarios, do role plays and so on.
If it’s something from your book, just send them the page or chapter ahead of time.
And if you’re going somewhere like China – oh boy!
Let’s just say you can know every word in the entire Mandarin phrasebook, but if you’re totally butchering the tones and pronunciation, they won’t know what you're on about.
You’ve got to practise speaking with a real person!
If you need a budget option, there’s always Language Exchange, which is free. HelloTalk is good – just pick the free option, and go for it.
Whatever you choose, speaking practice is going to help you to not freeze up when you’re on the streets of Beijing or Moscow.
By the way, if you think your cute little app friend is giving you enough of the right speaking practice, keep reading, there’s something you need to know!
#5 Carry A Notebook
I love this idea, because you can really make the language personal.
Keep a little vocabulary notebook on you – just for the language, nothing else goes in there! Take it everywhere, and write down new words you pick up along the way.
Yep, I’ll say it again: locals are highly likely to use expressions you've never heard before, not even in the best “speak like a local” books.
If you want to blend in, capture those moments.
It’s also worth scribbling down the written versions of any essential things you want or need for daily life, especially if they’re quite specific. It can be really hard to find cheese in Thailand, or big shoes in Japan!
And if there’s an emergency, or you’re about to miss your ride home, do you really want to bust out your 372-page phrase book?
I wager you’re not going to find “Is this the last train out of Tokyo?” before the last train out of Tokyo leaves the station!!
So have lines like this in your notebook, along with details of your accommodation, and practise asking in case you get lost.
Honestly, in some places it could even keep you safe – but let’s save that for the next section.
So how should you do this? Keep it simple:
Write down the English meaning, the Romanized version if it’s a different script, and write it in the original script too. Now you’re winning.
But the biggest win we’re going for with the notebook is getting native speakers to write things down for you!
Sounds fun, right?
Say somebody greets you in a way you’ve never heard before – get them to write it in your book so you can learn it! Or anything else you want to know.
Most people will love being asked to write down a phrase or two. And watch that book fill up so fast! The really cool part is it will become a nice little memory keeper of your journey.
#6 Practise Situations In Advance
Before you go, look around your place and ask yourself: What are the things I need every day, and what kind of scenarios could I find myself in? What would I say in that situation? Especially a tricky situation…
Now go learn the best words for that. Write them in your notebook – yep, same one. Get it warmed up!
Say you find yourself getting harassed a lot by vendors – and let's face it, in certain places people will follow you.
But if you calmly smile and say, “Not today, thank you” using the exact words they would’ve used, you not only get instant street cred, but they’ll probably also leave you alone because you sound like you live there!
Practise for any unusual situations that worry you:
- How you’re going to place your very particular, fussy food orders
- What you'll say if you get lost in a dodgy neighbourhood
Practise the exact words, and how the scene might play out. Refine your language around that situation. Literally have out-loud dialogues with yourself – weird, but it works.
You can practise anything you want – this is your life! Requests, excuses, explanations, whatever you think you’ll need.
Here’s a fun tip:
If there’s a phrase you keep forgetting how to say, record yourself saying it on your phone, and then when you’re in the situation and can’t remember, go stand where no-one can hear and play it to yourself just before you have to say it. You might feel like a parrot, but a parrot gets the words right!
#7 Hang Out With Locals
Making friends you can hang out with is by far the quickest way to get speaking more confidently.
You don't need a whole crowd, just a couple of people who like your company. You’re not trying to force anything – this is all very spontaneous!
Just find people who’re doing things you enjoy. Maybe there’s a group going to all the festivals, or doing weekend adventure trips, or playing beach volleyball.
Make native friends and let them teach you phrases. In Brazil, I met some local musicians and ended up jamming with them. And my Brazilian Portuguese accent became very natural sounding.
And you never know how good you'll end up getting in the language!
The point is, you want to get over your initial terror of actually speaking the language out loud in a real situation. So even the guy behind the bar in your hotel is good for a daily chat – ask him to skip the English with you.
The reason my Portuguese sounds natural is because I made friends in Brazil. And one day when you can speak like the locals do, you’ll thank me for the push!
#8 Practise For If You (Or They) Go Blank
Picture the scene: You’ve practised saying this exact phrase out loud 5 times, but now you're sitting here saying it and they have no idea what you’re talking about.
And because that’s all you learned, you don’t know how to rephrase what you said, so what now?
Confusion ensues!
And honestly, sometimes people might be a bit rude, which can throw you off your game and get you all flustered, so you forget everything you ever learned.
It happens.
What are you going to do – make a quick escape?!
Not everyone is great at understanding your accent. Some people are gonna be downright terrible at it. But you can be ready for this – and here’s the trick…
Strip it back! You don’t always speak in full sentences, do you? Well, neither does the rest of the world. And sometimes less is more.
Say you’re buying something – how many words do you really need? What are you trying to communicate? Just stick to the basics and they’ll get the message:
- “How much?”
- “55 Euros.”
- “Thank you.”
That’s fewer words to pronounce, so you've got this!
No awkward tourist.
It helps a tonne to also watch what others are doing. Observe how people call the waitress, how they apologise. And just do what they do. Keep it super simple, and be nice – the native speaker might actually be nervous about you!
#9 Carry A Book Of Short Stories
If you’re not a total beginner and you understand the very basics of a language, here’s a fun way to keep your head out of English:
Carry a book of short stories for beginners in your bag, and let this be your go-to reading material whenever you’re relaxing, or on the train or bus.
Something really simple is perfect – especially if it comes with an audio version.
I have students who never travel without one of these books, which is great, because it’s a way to keep your mind engaged in the language, instead of switching to English. Plus you’re learning new things on the go.
Actually, a book of conversations could be even better because the story characters are travellers, too, so you get all these easy little dialogues you can practise.
You could start reading your book in the days leading up to your trip, and then lie on the beach reading like you’ve totally got this language!
#10 Use A Language App
Okay I don’t normally advocate the use of language learning apps, just because there is no app in the world that's going to make you fluent in a language.
However, if you just want some practise saying things, a decent app with flashcards or phrases can be really useful when your trip’s just around the corner.
But then make it actually work for you:
Do all the speaking bits out loud, and get your mouth used to pronouncing the words.
And for the love of all things good, please only focus on natural language.
Some apps have really silly dialogue because they think weird phrases are memorable. But to me, that's about as helpful as a snake in my boot.
Another of these essential language apps for travel is a good translation app that’s specially for the language you’ll need – it can help in a pinch. Just don’t forget your charger and headphones!
FAQs On Learning A Language For Travel (+ Final Thoughts)
What Is The Best Language To Learn For Travel?
It kind of depends where you're going.
If you base your choice on how many people speak that language, you could end up learning Mandarin, which is mostly useful if you plan to go to China. Although Chinese tourists do get around!
Another possibility is to learn Spanish which opens doors, not only to Spain, but also most of Central and Latin America. If you plan to travel in Africa, French could be useful. Knowing Russian can also make communication easier in many parts of the world.
French and Spanish are much easier to learn though if English is your native language.
How To Learn A Language Fast For Travel?
You can learn a language fast for travel by following these tips:
#1 Get a good travel-focused phrasebook
#2 Focus on listening skills
#3 Memorise useful words and phrases
#4 Get daily speaking practice
#5 Carry a notebook
#6 Practise situations in advance
#7 Hang out with locals
#8 Practise for if you (or they) go blank
#9 Carry a book of short stories
#10 Use a language app
Should You Learn A Language Before Travelling?
While you can't learn a language to fluency necessarily before travelling, no matter where you go, the locals will always appreciate it if you can say a few basic words and phrases like “hello”, “thank you” etc.
How Long Does It Take To Learn A Language For Travel?
If you focus on committing basic phrases to memory and learning common questions and answers, with a focus on speaking and listening, you can be ready for your next trip in just a few weeks.
Of course, you won't be able to learn the language in-depth in that time, but you will at least have some basics you can use to communicate with locals or get out of sticky situations.
So there you have it – my 10 best tips on how to learn a language for travel.
All that's left to do is book your trip (if you haven't already) and start learning some words and phrases.
Olly Richards
Creator of the StoryLearning® Method
Olly Richards is a renowned polyglot and language learning expert with over 15 years of experience teaching millions through his innovative StoryLearning® method. He is the creator of StoryLearning, one of the world's largest language learning blogs with 500,000+ monthly readers.
Olly has authored 30+ language learning books and courses, including the bestselling "Short Stories" series published by Teach Yourself.
When not developing new teaching methods, Richards practices what he preaches—he speaks 8 languages fluently and continues learning new ones through his own methodology.
