The learning apps in this guide range from free to US$399 a year. Compare current public US prices, free tiers, and billing models, with official checkout links where the amount varies.
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This page compares consumer learning apps and course subscriptions. It does not cover the cost to build or commission a learning app.
Prices still change by region, platform, billing term, and promotion. The table was checked against official US pages on 20 August 2026, and the Deepstash, Headway, and Brilliant rows were rechecked on 6 September 2026. Where an official page does not expose one stable amount, the table says so and the product entry links you to the current offer.
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Current prices and charging models, checked 20 August and 6 September 2026.
Current prices and charging models, checked 20 August and 6 September 2026
Current US priceUS$0 or US$49.99 a year on the web
Important limitDaily lessons are unlimited and free, with audio included; Plus makes new courses, practice and Ask Coach unlimited and has a 7-day trial. This is our app.
Current US priceUS$0 for the feed; Pro sold monthly or yearly
Important limitThe free feed is the core product. Its US App Store listing shows several monthly and yearly Pro entries rather than one price, checked on 18 September 2026.
Current US priceUS$0, or US$12.99 monthly, US$29.99 quarterly, or US$89.99 yearly
Important limitThe free plan includes one selected summary a day. Headway says country, platform, and promotions change the checkout total; checked 6 September 2026.
Current US priceAnnual membership price shown at checkout
Important limitIt is sold as a full-library membership rather than one course.
The apps
Every app, with what it is bad at.
Start with the job you need the app to do, then read the tradeoff.
01
Khan Academy
School and university fundamentals
Khan Academy is a nonprofit that publishes full course sequences in maths, science, economics, and test preparation. Every lesson is free, there are no ads, and the practice sets tell you which idea you have not understood yet instead of only marking you wrong.
Best for
Rebuilding a foundation you missed at school, especially in maths and science.
Not for
Soft skills, workplace situations, and creative subjects.
Price
Core lessons and practice are free. Khanmigo tutoring for learners is a separate paid offer.
MIT publishes the actual materials from its courses: lecture notes, problem sets, exams, and often video. There is no account, no upsell, and no certificate. It is the raw course, and you supply the discipline.
Best for
Self-directed learners who want depth and do not need a credential.
Not for
Anyone who needs structure, reminders, or someone to tell them what to do next.
Anki is a flashcard tool that schedules each card for the day you are about to forget it. It is plain, it is powerful, and it does nothing to help you decide what is worth learning. Medical students and language learners rely on it for a reason.
Best for
Facts, vocabulary, and anything you must recall exactly.
Not for
Understanding a subject. Anki assumes you already know what belongs on the card.
Price
Free on desktop and Android. The iPhone app is a one-time purchase that funds the project.
Coursera hosts courses from universities and companies, with video lectures, readings, assessments, and paid certificate tracks. The first module of nearly every course can be previewed free, which makes it useful for checking the instructor and workload before paying.
Best for
Subjects where the name on the certificate matters to an employer or an application.
Not for
A ten-minute daily habit. Most courses expect real study blocks.
Price
The first module of nearly every course is free to preview. Continued access, graded work beyond the preview, certificates, and subscription plans are generally paid.
Practical and technical skills, bought one course at a time
Udemy is a marketplace, so anyone can publish a course. Quality varies a lot between instructors, which makes the ratings and the free preview lessons worth using before you buy. It is strong for software, tools, and other subjects where you want a specific technique.
Best for
One concrete tool or technique you need soon.
Not for
Consistent quality without doing your own checking, or a daily learning habit.
Price
Courses are bought individually and are discounted often.
Duolingo teaches languages, maths, music, and chess through short exercises on a guided path. Its streak, daily goal, reminders, and game mechanics make the return habit unusually visible, which is why the same shape is copied across education apps.
Best for
Building and holding a daily language habit through short guided exercises.
Not for
A broad subject outside its current catalogue, or reaching confident conversation through the app alone.
Price
Course access is free with ads. Optional paid tiers remove ads and add premium features.
Deepstash turns ideas from books, articles, podcasts, and videos into short cards that can be read in a few minutes, saved, and organised into collections. Its personalised feed is built for daily discovery more than for following one subject in order.
Best for
Replacing an idle social-media scroll with short ideas you can save for later.
Not for
A stable course sequence, assessed practice, or material where every interpretation must be checked against the original source.
Price
Free access includes idea cards and personal collections. Pro removes ads and adds features such as audio, offline access, and longer history.
Headway condenses nonfiction books into short text and audio summaries you can finish in a sitting. It is a fast way to decide whether a book is worth your time, and a reasonable way to recall one you have already read.
Best for
Covering a lot of book ideas quickly, or triaging a reading list.
Not for
Learning a skill. A summary tells you what a book argued, not how to do the thing.
Brilliant teaches through problems and not lectures. You are given a puzzle, you try it, and the explanation arrives once you have already thought about it. That order is harder work than watching a video and it is why the ideas tend to stay.
Best for
People who want to think during a lesson instead of watching one.
Not for
Subjects outside maths, science, and computing, or learners who need unlimited daily access without a subscription.
Price
Brilliant Free provides two keys a day. Each key unlocks one lesson or practice set, and free users move through courses in order. Premium removes the daily limit, allows jumping ahead, removes ads, and gives full Koji access.
Cadence starts with a problem you want to solve or a curiosity you want to explore, then builds an ordered 7 to 30 lesson course around it. Each lesson takes about ten minutes, can be read or played as audio, and stays connected to the course. Lessons use checks or practice when they help, and Ask Coach stays inside the lesson.
Best for
Turning your own starting point into one coherent course you can keep progressing through.
Not for
Anyone who needs a recognised certificate, a named instructor, or a language course with speaking practice.
Price
Free to start, with unlimited daily lessons and audio and 4 lesson voices included, and 2 new custom courses a month. Plus adds 8 more voices, for 12 in total, and makes new courses, practice, and Ask Coach unlimited for US$49.99 a year on the web, with a 7-day trial.
Blinkist is the longest running app in the book summary category and covers a large nonfiction catalogue in text and audio. The same limit applies as with any summary app: you are getting the argument, not the practice.
Best for
Deciding which nonfiction books deserve the full read.
Not for
Building a skill, or anything you need to be able to do afterwards.
MasterClass films well-known practitioners talking about their craft, and the production quality is the point. You get perspective and taste from people at the top of a field. What you rarely get is a graded path that tells you whether you are improving.
Best for
Perspective, motivation, and taste in a creative field.
The differences between apps matter less than these, which apply across nearly all of them.
Buying through an app store instead of the web. Platform fees are often reflected in a higher in-app price, so the same subscription can cost noticeably more on your phone than in a browser.
Annual plans billed as one payment. The per-month figure in the marketing is the annual price divided by twelve, and you pay all of it up front. That is fine if you use it, and it is the most common way people pay for a year of something they used for three weeks.
Trials that require a card. A trial you have to cancel is a purchase with an opt-out. Set a reminder for two days before it ends, on the day you sign up.
Region pricing. The figure you see quoted in an article is usually the United States price. Yours may be higher or lower, and currency conversion and local tax are applied at checkout.
Renewal at a different rate. An introductory discount often renews at full price a year later, quietly, on a card you have forgotten about.
Compare like with like
The price only makes sense beside the learning job.
Khan Academy and MIT OpenCourseWare are hard to beat when their academic catalogue covers your subject. Coursera Plus costs more because it combines a large course library with certificates from recognised providers. Udemy makes more sense when one specific course solves the problem and you do not need a continuing subscription.
Brilliant charges for a specialist interactive STEM experience. Blinkist and MasterClass sell access to a catalogue. Cadence charges for courses built around the goal you enter. A cheaper product is still wasted money when its content model cannot cover the thing you came to learn.
Before you pay
Check what you already have access to.
Two sources of free access are consistently overlooked, and both cover paid products.
Public libraries. Many library systems provide LinkedIn Learning free to cardholders, and LinkedIn publishes a help page for library patrons explaining the sign-in. Availability varies by library system, so check your own.
Your employer. A lot of companies hold LinkedIn Learning or Coursera seats that go unused because nobody announced them, and many have a learning budget that will cover a subscription if you ask.
Where we fit
What Cadence charges, stated plainly.
We are the people who make Cadence, so judge this section on the evidence and not on our say-so.
The free plan builds 2 new custom courses a month and opens as many lessons a day as you want, with audio included. Plus makes new courses, practice, and Ask Coach unlimited at US$49.99 a year on the web with a 7-day trial. We quote our own price because we control it and it is on our pricing page.
If your budget is genuinely zero, Khan Academy and MIT OpenCourseWare currently cost nothing to access, and they are built for academic subjects. We would rather point you there than take money for the wrong fit.
Put it into practice
Start it today, ten minutes at a time.
Cadence builds a course around your own goal instead of a catalogue, with short daily lessons, practice and saved progress. Cadence is our app.
Questions
Common questions.
How much do learning apps cost?
They range from free to several hundred US dollars a year. Khan Academy and MIT OpenCourseWare cost nothing. Coursera Plus publicly lists US$59 a month or US$399 a year in the United States. Udemy sells individual courses as one-time purchases and offers eligible learners a Personal Plan, with prices that vary by account and market. Cadence is free for unlimited daily lessons, with Plus at US$49.99 a year on the web.
Why is a learning app more expensive on my phone than on the web?
App store platform fees are commonly reflected in a higher in-app subscription price. If a product offers web checkout, comparing the two before you subscribe is usually worth the two minutes it takes.
Are annual learning app subscriptions worth it?
They are cheaper per month and they are also how people pay for a year of something they used for three weeks. Take the annual plan only if you have already used the product consistently for a month. The advertised monthly figure on an annual plan is the yearly price divided by twelve, charged up front.
How do I avoid being charged after a free trial?
Set a calendar reminder for two days before the trial ends on the same day you sign up, instead of trusting that you will remember. A trial that requires a card is effectively a purchase with an opt-out, and the opt-out is deliberately easy to miss.
Can I get paid learning apps for free?
Often, through a public library or an employer. Many library systems provide LinkedIn Learning free to cardholders, and LinkedIn publishes a help page for library patrons covering the sign-in. Many employers hold unused Coursera or LinkedIn Learning seats, or have a learning budget that covers a subscription if you ask.
See it in concrete terms
Open a real Cadence course.
These Cadence courses can be started on the free plan, with the syllabus visible before you sign up.
We compared current public US consumer prices and the shape of each charge. For every app we identified whether it is free permanently, free with a limit, sold by the course, or sold as a recurring subscription. We state a number only when the product publishes a stable public amount on an official page, and otherwise direct the reader to the current checkout.
What we checked directly: On 20 August 2026 we opened the official pricing, plan, help, or store page for every app named here. We checked the US amount where public, the billing term, free access, trial or refund language, and where the paid boundary sits.
Limits of this review: We did not purchase every product or enter every checkout. Prices can change after the review date and can differ by region, account, app store, tax, and promotion. When a company does not publish one stable public price, we report the charging model instead. Library and employer access varies, so confirm your own.
