Help1 General Questions

What is busuu.com?

How can I improve my language skills with busuu.com?

What languages can I learn with busuu.com?

Do I have to pay to use busuu.com?

How can I join busuu.com?

2 Questions about how to use busuu.com

What is 'my Language Garden'?

What can I do in my Language Garden?

What is a course?

What is the Catalogue?

What is a Learning Unit?

What can I do within my learning units?

What is a grammar unit?

How to obtain my certificate?

What is "My Vocabulary"?

What are my "Mistakes"?

How can I chat with other users?

Can I speak or even video-chat with another user?

How do I add friends?

Why should I add friends on busuu.com?

How can I be sure that my exercises will be corrected?

How does the comment rating function work?

What are groups?

How can I join a group?

How can I create a group?

What are my responsibilities as a leader of a group?

What are busuu-berries?

How can I earn busuu-berries?

What can I do with my busuu-berries?

What is the berry-ranking?

What is my busuu.com status?

What are the busuu-badges?

How to practice my pronunciation?

How to post a voice comment on a voice recording exercise?

3 Technical questions

Why didn't I receive the confirmation email after registration?

Why does the chat application not work for me?

Why can't I upload or change my profile picture?

What can I do, if I have forgotten my password?

How can I introduce special characters?

How do I change the language interface of the page?

How can I change the languages I am learning?

How do I delete my account?

4 Questions about the premium membership

Why should I become a Premium Member?

What different types of subscriptions do you offer?

How much does it cost?

How can I pay?

Where can I see my Premium Membership information?

How do I renew my subscription?

How can I cancel my Premium Membership?

If I have paid, why is my account not yet premium?

1 General Questions

What is busuu.com?

busuu.com is an online community for learning languages! Instead of studying alone at home

with your uninspiring grammar book, you can learn directly from native speakers around the

world. In addition to learning directly from other members, you can use our highly interactive

learning material completely free of charge. Additionally, by paying a minimal monthly fee, you

can become a Premium Member   and have access to even more functionalities and

learning material.

How can I improve my language skills with busuu.com?

There are two ways to improve your language skills with busuu.com:

1. Learn directly from a native speaker: you can connect to native speakers in the

busuu.com community by using our video-chat application in order to practice your

language skills.

2. Learn with the busuu.com learning content: we have prepared over 150 learning

units covering diverse topic areas and grammar units covering the most important

grammar points. The content is image and sound-based; you can listen to key

vocabulary, example phrases and dialogues pronounced by professional voice artists

speaking in their own language.

What languages can I learn with busuu.com?

Our learning material is currently available in English, German, French, Italian, Spanish,

Portuguese and Russian but we are working hard to include many more languages in the near

future!

By being part of this diverse online learning community, however, you have access to native

speakers speaking all the different languages around the world.

Do I have to pay to use busuu.com?

busuu.com can be used by all users for free! However, you have the option to pay a minimal

monthly fee to become a Premium Member. With that Premium account you gain access to

additional functionalities and more material which make your language learning easier and more

efficient. Find out more about the Premium Membership 

How can I join busuu.com?

Just go to the registration page of busuu.com and follow the instructions.

2 Questions about how to use busuu.com

What is 'my Language Garden'?

The Language Garden is a snapshot of your language skills. It shows the languages you are

learning and those you teach. The size of each tree indicates your learning progress in that

language. By clicking on a particular tree you can access the learning material of the language

concerned.

What can I do in my Language Garden?

1. Let your trees grow!

The more learning units you have finished and the more active you are within the community,

the bigger your language tree will be.

2. Get gifts for your Language Garden!

Of course you will be rewarded for your efforts! While finishing units within your courses and

passing a test related to them, you will receive a funny animated gift for your Language Garden.

3. Fight the bugs!

Whenever you make mistakes within the review session of a unit or a test within a course, nasty

bugs will attack your trees. If you don't study your vocabulary properly, your trees will be slowly

eaten up…

4. Make friends and teach other users!

For every 10 writing exercises you correct, you will receive one apple as a gift for your Language

Garden. Additionally, you can teach your native language to other users by clicking on the

language signs in the “I speak” area. There you will see a list of people who are learning the

language you are able to teach. Add them as your friends and start practicing your new

languages with them via busuu-talk.

What is a course?

busuu.com offers the possibility to do courses based on the recommended levels of the Common

European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEF). The courses are organized into 4 levels.

A1-Beginner 1, A2-Beginner 2, B1-Intermediate 1 and B2-Intermediate 2. Each course consists of

learning units, grammar units and tests.

When you are on your home page, click on the tree in your Language Garden that represents the

language you want to learn or on the “Go” button in the “Next Steps” area. Here you enter the

language area of the language you have chosen.

You will see a board game-like table in your language area. At the top of the table you can see

the names of the 4 different courses we offer: A1, A2, B1 and B2. Click on the course that you

think most suits your ability.

By hovering over the images you can enter each learning unit by clicking on “Go”. The courses

also contain exams which test you on the units studied within the course and you’ll get gifts for

your Language Garden if you complete them successfully.

What is the Catalogue?

The Catalogue is a list of all the learning and grammar units, arranged into levels and categories,

available on busuu.com. The Catalogue can be accessed by clicking on the Catalogue tab located

next to the Courses tab in the language area.

What is a Learning Unit?

A learning unit contains the most important vocabulary and phrases of a certain topic (e.g. “in

the hotel”, “the job interview”). At busuu.com, we currently offer more than 150 learning units in

Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese and English.

What can I do within my learning units?

Within each unit, you can practice your language skills in the following areas:

 Vocabulary: Firstly you will find the important phrases and vocabulary that you

need to know. If you are a Premium Member  , you can also listen to the key phrases.

 Dialogue: Then you can do a reading comprehension in the form of a dialogue and

answer questions to check your understanding. If you are a Premium Member  , you can

also listen to the audio of the dialogue.

 Writing exercise: You then write a short text and let other users correct you.

 busuu-talk: You can practice your language skills by connecting with native

speakers of our community. We offer an integrated video-chat-application which allows you to

chat or even speak with other users. If you access the busuu-talk from a learning unit you will

find a question related to the unit which you can discuss with your busuu-talk partner.

 Review: Finally, do a short review to check what you have learned.

 PDF: You can print out a PDF-transcript of all the grammar and learning units to

study even while you are not online. This function is only available if you are a Premium

Member 

 Podcast: You can listen to podcasts (audio-files) of all the vocabulary, example

sentences and dialogues of all the grammar and learning units. This function is only available

if you are a Premium Member 

 Voice recording: You can practice your pronunciation, by recording a character’s part

in a dialogue, and posting it for native speakers to correct you. Voice recording is only available

for Premium Members 

What is a grammar unit?

A grammar unit contains examples of the grammar usage of the most important points in

grammar in each language. The grammar units are supported by images, example phrases and

dialogues pronounced by professional voice artists speaking in their own language. They also

contain PDF’s and Podcasts. Grammar units are only available for Premium Members 

How to obtain my certificate?

The busuu.com certificate confirms that you have successfully passed our courses. This means

that you have finished all the learning units and have successfully passed all the exams within a

specific course. You can receive certificates for the levels A1, A2, B1 and B2. In order to receive a

certificate you need to be a Premium Member   as it is required to pass all grammar units.

 What is "My Vocabulary"?

Once you are in the Vocabulary section of a unit, you will find a small star next to the picture of

the vocabulary. By clicking on the yellow star you can mark all the vocabulary you would like to

learn in specific. Thereby, you are able to create your individual vocabulary pool. Then they will

be automatically saved to the section “My vocabulary” which you can review under “Marked”:

What are my "Mistakes"?

Whenever you make a mistake during the review session, this vocabulary will be automatically

added to “My Vocabulary” in the “Mistakes” tab. Once you are in “Mistakes”, you have the

possibility to study only the words you didn’t know. As soon as you get them right while

reviewing them, they will automatically disappear from the mistakes list.

How can I chat with other users?

Just click on the button marked "busuu-talk” . This button appears in several areas of the

site, for example, within the profile of another user. The busuu-talk window will pop-up and you

can write something. The other user will get a notification that you would like to chat with them.

Once the other user accepts your invitation, you will be able to begin communicating with them.

On the right-hand side, you have 3 areas including a range of key words you can use in the

conversation, a translator, and the special characters needed in the different languages.

Can I speak or even video-chat with another user?

YES! Once the "busuu-talk" window is open, just click on the button "send a/v" (below the "send"

button) and then start talking! In addition to a micro-phone you may also use a standard webcam

to see and further interact with your learning partner.

How do I add friends?

Go to "search" on the top right-hand side of the home page. Here you can do a search according

to different criteria such as the languages the other user speaks, is learning, to the country they

are living in etc... Once you have done the search, you can invite the user you want by clicking

on the icon "add a friend"   . Then the user will receive a friend request and as soon as

he/she accepts it, you have a new friend at busuu.com.

Why should I add friends on busuu.com?

You should add friends to your profile to let them correct your posts, chat with them and practice

the language you are learning, and finally teach them your own language.

How can I be sure that my exercises will be corrected?

Once you have written a text in the writing exercise, click on “Submit and notify friends”. Then

you can choose up to five busuu.com friends to send your writing exercise to. They will receive a

notification in their busuu.com inbox to correct your posts.

 

How does the comment rating function work?

With this function you can rate the quality of comments of other users of the community. You

find the function on the right hand side of each comment below a writing post.

Click on the   button in case you agree or the   button in case you disagree with the

comment. This gives the other user who is learning the language an indication about the quality

of the corrections he/she receives. If at least 3 persons give them a  , the corrector will

receive 5 extra busuu-berries  .

What are groups?

Groups are a special area within busuu.com to share opinions about different topics with other

members of the community. In each group you can learn a specific language which is defined by

the group leader and which you can find in the description of the group.

Each group contains several topics on which you can post comments. To post a comment, go into

the topic and write a comment directly in the writing box or click on “answer” to comment on

another post. You can also invite your friends to join a group, by clicking on “Invite Friends”.

The activity rate of a group is defined by the number of dots you can see under the profile

picture:

 Low activity

 Medium activity

 High activity

How can I join a group?

You can search for different groups by using the menu “Groups” –>”Search Groups”. Once you

have found the group of your choice, visit its profile and click on “Join this group”. As soon as you

are a member, you can participate in the discussions.

How can I create a group?

To create a group you need to have at least 3 stars   Inside the group you can create

different discussion topics which your group members can then discuss with each other. By

choosing the discussion topic make sure that they are related to this group. Just click on “Create

a topic” in order to start the first discussion.

If you want to have a topic always on top of the other topics (like for example an introduction to

the group), click on “sticky” on the right hand side. There you can also edit or delete a topic.

What are my responsibilities as a leader of a group?

As a group leader you have to moderate your group. This means that you have to create new

discussion topics and answer questions within the discussions. By that you keep your group

active and stimulate the discussion. You can also invite new members to the group if you believe

that they might be interested in this topic.

If you create a group, you will be rewarded with the blue group leader badge   and 100

busuu-berries  . For managing one active group, you’ll receive the red group leader

badge   and 500 busuu-berries   and if you are the group leader of three active groups or

more, you’ll get the black leader badge   and will earn 1000 busuu-berries  .

What are busuu-berries?

busuu-berries reward your language learning efforts and your participation to help others of our

language learning community. So whenever you do a learning activity (e.g. finishing a unit) or

teach others (e.g. by correcting their writing posts) you will receive busuu-berries.

When you register for the first time on www.busuu.com, you are granted 10 busuu-berries as a

welcome gift!

How can I earn busuu-berries?

You receive busuu-berries for the following learning activities:

   • 5 busuu-berries: finishing one part of a learning unit (i.e. vocabulary, dialogue, writing-

exercise, busuu-talk, review)

   • 5 extra busuu-berries for an excellent writing exercise (rated by at least 3 people

with  .)

   • 20 busuu-berries: finishing an entire learning unit

   • 50 busuu-berries: completing a course-test

   • 1000 busuu-berries: finishing one complete course (i.e. A1, A2, B1 or B2)

You receive as well busuu-berries for the following activities:

   • 1 busuu-berry: inviting one of your friends to busuu.com via www.busuu.com/invite

   • 5 busuu-berries: correcting one writing exercise of another user

   • 5 extra busuu-berries: having done a very helpful correction (voted by at least 3 people with

the   button)

   • 100 busuu-berries: creating a group

   • 500 busuu-berries: being the leader of 1 active group

   • 1000 busuu-berries: being the leader of 3 active groups

What can I do with my busuu-berries?

Your busuu-berries show your activity and learning progress on busuu.com to other users of our

community. The more berries you have, the more active you are within our community.

But you can also use busuu-berries to motivate your busuu.com friends! Each time you press the

button “send busuu-berries”  to one of your friend, 1 of your busuu-berries will be

transferred to your friend and he/she will receive a motivational email. So you shouldn’t keep all

these delicious berries for yourself, share them as well with your friends!

What is the berry-ranking?

The berry-ranking shows your number of busuu-berries compared to those of your friends. By

that you can compete with your friends and see who the most active student is.

What is my busuu.com status?

Your “busuu status” is based on the number of busuu-berries you have collected.

If you have … You get …

More than 100 000 busuu-berries:

From 50 000 to 99 999 busuu-berries:

From 20 000 to 49 999 busuu-berries:

From 10 000 to 19 999 busuu-berries:

From 5 000 to 9 999 busuu-berries:

From 1 000 to 4 999 busuu-berries:

From 500 to 999 busuu-berries:

From 50 to 499 busuu-berries:

What are the busuu-badges?

busuu-badges reward specific activities you have done within our community:

You have commented on more than 100 posts

You have commented on more than 500 posts

You have commented on more than 1000 posts

You have commented on more than 3000 posts

You have more than 50 friends on busuu.com

You created a group on busuu.com

You are the leader of one active group on busuu.com

You are the leader of three active groups on busuu.com

You are a busuu-translator

You had a brilliant idea to improve www.busuu.com

You have successfully finished an A1 course

You have successfully finished an A2 course

You have successfully finished a B1 course

You have successfully finished a B2 course

How to practice my pronunciation?

To practice your pronunciation, you can record a short dialogue within the learning unit. It is like

a role play and you will take the part of one of the two characters. You can then send the voice

recording to native speakers for comments which will help you improve your pronunciation skills.

You can only do the pronunciation exercise if you have a microphone. You can either use the

microphone that is built in your computer or an external one. First of all, you will need to enable

your microphone. If it is disabled, the window below will appear.

It is important that you make sure that the allow button is clicked on the right hand side and the

remember box ticked. You are now ready to record!

Once your microphone is enabled, you will choose your character by clicking on one of the two

characters you would like to be. A green frame will indicate your choice of character. If you don’t

choose one, the system will automatically choose the second one for you.

The image below shows the first screen you see when entering the voice recording exercise. You

can now listen to your character’s part as well as the other character’s part by clicking on

the   button next to the text box.

Your character’s part will be indicated in green, as shown below.

To record it, click on the red record button   and wait until the 30 second countdown

appears. Record the sentence by speaking clearly, slowly and matching the volume of the voice

artist.

You can listen to what you recorded by clicking on the play button and you can record as many

times as you want.

Before submitting it at the end, you will be able to hear the full dialogue. If you are not satisfied

with the recording, you can record it again by clicking on  .

Once you are happy with the results, you can then submit the voice recording for corrections to

the community or to friends that you select by notifying them. You will also get 5 juicy busuu-

berries   for completing this pronunciation exercise.

How to post a voice comment on a voice recording exercise?

All voice recordings done by the community will be in the section Review posts of others,

followed by this icon  .

Once you enter the correction section, you will have the possibility to correct voice recording

exercises done by others in three different ways.

First, and as within a normal writing exercise, you have the possibility to rate the pronunciation

exercise by giving them up to five stars.

Second, you can enter a written comment in the comment box in order to describe any mistake

in the pronunciation or make any other comment which helps the user improve his/her

pronunciation.

Third, you can add an additional voice comment by using the feature below. Thereby you can

record the text yourself pointing out the correct pronunciation to the other user.

While correcting others’ voice posts, be sure to evaluate the clarity of the language, and the

pronunciation. Like in the normal writing exercise, you will also be rewarded with 5 busuu-

berries   for correcting the pronunciation exercise of another user.

3 Technical questions

Why didn't I receive the confirmation email after registration?

Your confirmation email might have arrived in your spam folder, especially if you are a hotmail or

msn user. If, after checking your junk/spam folder, you still haven't received confirmation, please

contact us at info[@]busuu.com and we will re-send your confirmation message.

Why does the chat application not work for me?

You need to enable pop-ups in your browser in order to be able to use our chat-application.

Why can't I upload or change my profile picture?

Your picture needs to be uploaded in the correct file format: either .jpg or .gif and the file-size

should not exceed 1 MB. Please do not use spaces or special characters when naming your

picture. If the new picture still does not appear, press “Ctrl F5” to update the page.

What can I do, if I have forgotten my password?

Click on the link in the log-in field and enter the email address you used for registration. A

message enabling you to reset your password will be sent to your account.

How can I introduce special characters?

When you are writing your message, click on the key icon   on the left of your text. Here you

can choose the special characters you need.

How do I change the language interface of the page?

Go to "Settings" on the top right-hand side of your personal home page and there you can

change the "user interface language".

How can I change the languages I am learning?

You have to go to "add a new language" just on the opposite side of "my busuu.com Language

Garden" on your personal page. You can also go to "settings" on the top right-hand side of the

home page and then to the section "Languages".

How do I delete my account?

Go to "Settings" on the top right-hand side of your personal home page and then click on the last

section "Remove account". Here please, select the reasons for doing so as a feedback and then

click on "Confirm Account Removal".

4. Questions about the premium membership

Why should I become a Premium Member?

As a Premium Member you get access to additional functionalities and new material. The

Premium functions are designed in such a way as to make your language learning with

busuu.com even easier and more efficient. Please follow the link to see a detailed description of

the Premium Functions 

What different types of subscriptions do you offer?

We currently offer 1 month, 3 months and 6 months subscription plans. You can choose the one

which best fits your needs and your pocket. Find here an overview of the Subscription

Plans 

How much does it cost?

We offer the Premium Membership at a very competitive price. Here you find the current prices

of the different

Subscription Plans 

How can I pay?

You can currently pay via Visa, Mastercard or American Express. Additionally you can pay with

PayPal or via bank transfer. We will continuously extend the payment methods we offer you.

Please send us an email at info[@]busuu.com in case you want us to include a certain payment

method we don’t offer yet.

Where can I see my Premium Membership information?

You can find all the relevant information (price of subscription, length of subscription plan etc..)

in your Subscription page 

How do I renew my subscription?

For your convenience, we will renew your subscription automatically. If you have for example a

monthly subscription, we will renew your subscription every month. If you have a 3 month

subscription, we will renew your subscription every 3 months for another 3 months etc..You can

cancel your subscription at any time on your Subscription page  

How can I cancel my Premium Membership?

You can cancel your Premium Membership at any time on your Subscription page  .

If I have paid, why is my account not yet premium?

If you have paid with credit card & paypal, it might take some hours until your account is

upgraded automatically. If you have paid with bank transfer, it might take up to 5 working days

until we have received your money and will then automatically upgrade your account. This will

only happen if you have put the correct reference number in your bank transfer. The reference

number will be given after you have finished the purchasing process. If you have put the wrong

or no reference number, your money will be automatically refunded back (approx. after 10 days)

and you have to start the process again by going to the 9

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