Lingua
"How long will it take?" is the first question every learner asks and the one most answers dodge. It has a real answer, with real numbers, as long as you first say what "learn" means. The scale nearly everyone uses for that is the CEFR, the Common European Framework of Reference, which describes six levels from A1 to C2.
The six levels, in one line each
The official descriptors are long; this is the practical version.
- A1 – Breakthrough. You can introduce yourself, ask and answer simple questions about where you live and what you own, and manage if the other person speaks slowly and helps.
- A2 – Waystage. Routine situations: shopping, directions, your job, your family, in simple sentences. You understand the gist of short, clear messages.
- B1 – Threshold. You cope with most situations while travelling, describe experiences and plans, and follow the main points of clear speech on familiar topics. This is where a language becomes usable.
- B2 – Vantage. You follow complex texts and native speakers at normal speed, hold a real conversation without strain for either side, and argue a point of view. Most universities and many employers ask for B2.
- C1 – Effective proficiency. Long, demanding texts; flexible, precise language for work and study; implicit meaning.
- C2 – Mastery. You understand practically everything and express yourself with fine shades of meaning. Few learners need this and fewer reach it.
How many hours
Two sets of figures are commonly quoted.
The Cambridge and Council of Europe guidance for English gives roughly 90 to 100 guided hours to reach A1, 180 to 200 for A2, 350 to 400 for B1, 500 to 600 for B2, 700 to 800 for C1 and 1,000 to 1,200 for C2, cumulative from zero. These are classroom hours; add the time you spend alone.
The US Foreign Service Institute publishes how long its diplomats need to reach professional working proficiency, roughly B2/C1, and its numbers show why the language you choose matters. For an English speaker, Spanish takes about 600 to 750 class hours. Russian and Vietnamese are in the 1,100-hour group. Japanese and Korean are in the hardest group at about 2,200 hours. The same logic runs in reverse: a Korean speaker learning Japanese has a much shorter road than one learning Spanish, because grammar and vocabulary are closer.
Turning hours into a calendar
Take the total for your language and level and divide by the honest number of hours you will put in per week. At 30 minutes a day, that is 3.5 hours a week.
- Spanish to B1 for an English speaker: roughly 350 hours, so about two years at half an hour a day, or one year at an hour a day.
- Japanese to B1: roughly double, so plan for three to four years at the same pace, or accept that an hour a day is the realistic minimum.
These are not discouraging numbers once you notice the second half of the arithmetic: every one of those hours is also thirty minutes you did not need to find all at once. Regular short sessions are how the totals actually get reached; the learners who stall are the ones waiting for a free month.
Find out where you are now
Levels are only useful if you know yours. A placement test asks progressively harder questions across grammar, vocabulary and comprehension until it finds the level where you start to fail, and it is far more honest than "I studied it at school".
LinguaPair has a placement test built in: a short adaptive test from A1 to C2 that places you and marks your level on the course map, so you know where to start instead of guessing (the levels above A1 are part of Premium). Retake it after a few months to see the level move. The course itself runs from A0, for a writing system you have never seen, through C1, and each lesson shows its level, so the hours you put in are always visibly attached to a rung on the same ladder.