Seriously, How Long Does It Take To Learn Mandarin?

Hello.

I know you.

You’re looking for a shortcut to fluency in Mandarin Chinese, aren’t you?

Well, I’ve got good news and bad news, so I’ll start with the bad, AKA, the cold, hard truths.

But before we even get to that, I’m going to give you the short answer.

Even with an excellent aptitude for learning Mandarin Chinese, you won’t reach a proficient/intermediate/conversational level until you’ve invested a few thousand hours of study to the language. This ‘study’ can take many forms, but for almost everyone, there is a direct correlation with how much time you’ve spent with the language and how fluent you are. There are no shortcuts to learning Mandarin!

The Bad News for Mandarin Learners

To become proficient or conversationally ‘fluent’ in Mandarin Chinese, it’s going to take a few thousand hours of active study time.
If you’re a native speaker of a European language, it will take you longer to master master Chinese than most other European languages with the same amount of study time.
I don’t care how many claims you’ve heard or read, you CAN’T become fluent in 3 months.

That last one annoys me the most, and I see it all the time – people putting a time limit on learning a skill in order to sell something.

Talk about sucking the joy out of life…

The Good News for Mandarin Learners

Before you get too disheartened and click away, there are definitely a few things to be positive about when it comes to learning Mandarin Chinese and making tangible progress in a timely manner.

You are spoiled for choice with resources. The amount of quality tools on the market now is absolutely stupendous. There’s a lot of rubbish out there as well, but it has never been easier to learn a language.
It’s not as complicated as you think. It takes time, commitment, and persistence, but it ain’t rocket science. Think about the people all over the world who are bilingual. Mandarin Chinese is a second language for hundreds of millions of Chinese people. If they can do it, so can you.
The benefits are enormous. Seriously, it would take too long to compile a list of possible benefits that arise out of being a foreigner who can speak Mandarin Chinese to an upper intermediate-advanced level. Use your imagination, and think about where it could take you. If you’re struggling for ideas, check out 11 Reasons to Learn Mandarin in 2022.

Stop stalling. How long does it take to learn Mandarin!?

It depends.

I know you don’t like that answer and you’re looking for cold, hard numbers.

Well, they don’t exist, and the quicker you accept that, the better.

The closest indication of how long it takes to learn Mandarin comes from the table from the US Department of State. You know, the one that gets thrown around every time someone asks the internet this question?

How Can I Learn Faster?

As you can see from the table above, Mandarin Chinese is a category 4 language and it takes around 2200 hours of study to reach ‘fluency’ in Mandarin.

This is, at best, a vague calculation.

There are people I’ve met personally who have learned faster than this, and plenty of people who learned much more slowly (including myself). Your pace of learning depends on a variety of factors that need to be looked at in more detail.

Basically, yes you can learn faster, but it depends largely on the following…

Desire

This is the biggest variable when it comes to learning Mandarin, or any language, or anything. When it comes to language learning, hard work trumps any kind of natural talent (until talent starts to work hard), but this isn’t the Olympics, so it doesn’t matter. Don’t take my word for it. Ask the scientists.

Those I’ve met who have gone from complete beginners in Mandarin to fluent in the shortest time all have one thing in common: they want it, need it, love it, breathe it.

For example, there was a Korean guy on my Mandarin language course at Sun-Yat Sen University in Guangzhou, China. He arrived not knowing a word of Chinese. He went to class every day just like most of us, but it’s what else he did that’s important…

He then went home and studied all afternoon. In the evening, he went for another two hours with a private tutor. he had a language partner. He knew about all kinds of Chinese music, TV shows, and movies. he changed the language on his phone to Chinese. At the weekend, he volunteered for the Chinese department doing whatever they told him to do.

He passed the HSK 5 with a decent score in one year.

Now, do you have to do what the Korean guy did in order to learn Chinese? Nope. Most people don’t.

But it helps.

Aptitude

I know I’ve just said hard work and desire are more important than aptitude, but aptitude still matters.

The harsh reality is that some people are better at learning languages than others.

Once again though, how much aptitude matters in language learning is still debatable. No matter what your aptitude is for language learning (it’s something that’s impossible to measure anyway), if you want it enough, you’ll get there.

I don’t believe I’m naturally gifted with languages, and I’ve managed to do quite well.

Commitment

The vast majority of language learners study for a few weeks, get bored, and then quit.

If you want to gain any benefit from regular studying, you need to commit to at least a few hundred hours before you really know this isn’t right for you.

If you do this and it causes you nothing but pain, that’s OK. Language learning isn’t for everyone.

But just think for a second about how easy it is to find a spare unit of time each day. Be honest with yourself about what is an essential activity in your day. If it doesn’t bring you results, get rid of it, and replace it with study time.

Taking a poop? That’s 5 minutes (or much longer if you’re my dad). A set of 10 vocabulary flashcards right there. Done.

Driving to work? Listen to one of the thousands of podcasts available in the resource section at the end of this post.

Scanning Facebook to see who’s cheated on their spouse again? Get rid of it and read a short story on one of the many graded reader apps available.

There are so many cases of ‘dead time’ in your day that can be utilised to learn Chinese. These small segments of study time will compound over time and lead up to a highly valued and useful skill.

Final Pointers

With very few other life commitments and a tenacious, hardworking spirit, you can reach an upper-intermediate/advanced level of Mandarin Chinese in less than two years.

But (and it’s a big but), this is rare, and many people aren’t up to the challenge.

You don’t need to be a smart person to learn Mandarin Chinese, but you need to accept that it will take a considerable amount of sustained study to reach a proficient level.