While beginners tend to share lots of learning needs and goals, one advanced Italian learner might look totally different from another.
Maybe you’re a confident, fluid speaker with garbled writing, while your friend can read pages and pages of advanced Italian prose but clams up in an actual conversation.
Do you want to level up your language skills and become a whole new type of Italian speaker?
In this post, I’ll introduce you to 28 fantastic and diverse resources for Italian lessons online.
Each course is individualized, scheduling is flexible and tutors are native Italian speakers who also speak good English and have teaching experience.
Lessons are 55 minutes long and focused on what you want to accomplish. Discuss your goals with your tutor before you dive in and you’ll receive guidance and a chance to communicate with a native speaker.
There are no books or materials to purchase; tutors will provide online sources whenever necessary to maximize learning on an individualized basis.
You can book a 30-minute trial lesson for free to assess the program.
Apart from offering users a slough of resources with a paid membership, ItalianPod101 has a free YouTube channel full of quick and challenging listening comprehension exercises.
The narrator asks a multiple-choice question, then you listen to the dialogue—first without and then with Italian subtitles.
As you listen the second time, choices are eliminated based on evidence given during the dialogue, leaving only the correct answer.
These exercises are each about five minutes long and are great if you only have a short time to study.
Online Italian Club is a great resource for grammar topics you’re having trouble with.
The website offers material for each of the six levels of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (A1-C2). You can also pick and choose the topics you’d like to focus on, so go ahead and go straight to the vocabulary and grammar section!
If you’d like to get confirmation about your current level, Online Italian Club also gives you the opportunity to double-check it with an online level test.
This website provides a thorough approach to Italian studies but gives you the flexibility you need to focus on the components of the language you need the most. Just look up any topic you could use some help with and you’ll have a full lesson ready for you.
IE Languages is more of a reference resource than a place to find lessons, per se.
Click on any topic to see a thorough explanation of it, complete with examples, charts and audio recordings.
In addition to nearly three hours of audio files, their tutorials come in a handy e-book format with 180 pages of grammar and vocabulary topics. (You can download the first 10 pages for free to see if it’s right for you.)
And if you prefer your lessons on the go, this resource is perfect for those who don’t want to carry around heavy textbooks since it allows you to load everything onto your tablet, e-reader or smartphone.
Live Lingua is great resource where students can dip their toes in the water before diving in.
Students can use Live Lingua’s tools to check each teacher individually, looking at their background, time zone, schedule flexibility and more. The teacher profiles include tons of detail to make sure that every student can find the tutor who’s the best option for them.
Live Lingua also has the unique option of sorting tutors by what age groups they work with best. This means that everyone from children to seniors can customize their experience to their advantage.
Live Lingua has a support staff that works around the clock to accommodate its customers and the hours you purchase from them never expire. Its payment plan only requires one lesson as a minimum purchase, which gives students the opportunity to opt out if desired.
Tired of conjugating verbs and memorizing vocabulary? To spice up your Italian lessons a little, try News in Slow Italian. This beginner course breaks up the monotony by covering recent news stories in slow and clear Italian.
Not only is it easy for early learners to understand, but it also offers real-life context that’ll help you apply your Italian knowledge to everyday life.
There is a section for beginner, intermediate, and advanced learners, so no matter what your level is, you’ll be able to study using this useful resource.
Studying a new language can be daunting at times, which is why Online Italian Club offers engaging, user-friendly content that helps facilitate the learning process. In this course, you’ll find grammar and vocabulary lessons, conversation prompts, listening exercises, verb conjugations and much more.
Lessons are divided into levels from A1 all the way up to C2, with each section containing materials such as grammar explanations, listening practice, vocabulary and more.
If you’re looking for a comprehensive list of things you’ll need to know in Italian, this is a great place to start.
Like Online Italian Club, One World Italiano offers learners a wide variety of content to keep them entertained and focused. You’ll find plenty of useful exercises in this course, including grammar explanations, dialogues, dictations, practice exercises and even a video course.
These collections of lessons will give you the opportunity to work on your reading, writing, speaking and listening skills in numerous ways.
Along with the grammar, culture and vocabulary materials that are available, there is also the option to take a variety of courses, so there are plenty of options to help improve your Italian using this site.
For all of you learners who don’t have a ton of time to spare, LearnItalianPod has you covered. This course allows you to download Italian lessons on-the-go so you can brush up on your skills wherever you are.
With clear explanations and a wide range of topics, LearnItalianPod will further prepare you for conversing with Italian speakers.
There’s also plenty of information about traveling to Italy, lifestyle & culture and food & drinks, so you’ll be able to brush up on your language skills as well as your overall cultural knowledge about Italy.
This is a useful resource for learners to get a well-rounded understanding of Italian language and culture.
These lessons are technically listed as intermediate, but they’re targeted at both intermediate and advanced learners.
These lessons will give you well-rounded skills, from conversational confidence to grammar knowledge. All lessons are taught fully in Italian by a native, so you’ll be immersed in the authentic language from minute one. Each video lesson comes with a downloadable PDF.
The lessons have exercises for listening, speaking and grammar so you can apply your new skills. The best part is that you get lifetime access to the course and all its updates, and they’re always improving. They currently list upcoming features like quizzes and video captions.
FluentU is an immersive program that creates lessons for learners through authentic Italian videos.
There are interactive, translated captions—just hover over any word to see its definition, an associated image and other videos in which it appears. Keep track of unknown words with personalized vocabulary lists, flashcards and quizzes that adapt based on what you already know.
Videos are conveniently organized into lessons and sortable by difficulty, so you can work toward a particular objective, topic or skill that’s at the level you need it to be.
Plus, FluentU uses a spaced repetition system (SRS) to test you with flashcards and quizzes that keep new words and structures in your long-term memory.
Want to prove your advanced Italian chops to an employer or school? You’ll want to get CILS or CELI certified. These are two of the major certificates for Italian as a second language.
Porta d’Oriente is an Italian immersion school that offers an online CILS and CELI prep course. You’ll be working on an e-learning platform but you’ll still get personalized attention from an Italian tutor. They’ll cover all exam portions including reading and listening comprehension, writing, grammar, vocabulary and oral production.
They also offer two practice exams so you can go into the real one at your most confident. Best of all, you can follow the course entirely on your schedule!
Italki is a service that matches up native-speaking teachers with language learners.
Browse the dozens of profiles of Italian language teachers, watch their video introductions and see reviews from past students.
Prices are affordable and generally range from $6 to $30, so you can pick someone who easily fits into your budget and can provide the guidance you need.
From there the lessons are customized to fit your individual needs. Lessons are flexible and work around your schedule.
Verbling operates on a similar premise as italki, since you can select a teacher for private lessons.
However, with Verbling, you buy blocks of lessons on a particular topic. You then select a block of time for the instructor to go through the lessons with you from a calendar of availability.
Whether it’s exam preparation or advanced grammar, this is a very cost-effective way to get face-to-face (or screen-to-screen) instruction.
The real advantage of sites like these is that you receive guidance, motivation and feedback from the instructors. If you’re only learning online, then paying for an opportunity like this is a necessary investment.
Learn Italian Online connects you with experienced Italian tutors from the Centro Culturale Conero school in Italy. They offer customizable, one-on-one Italian lessons over Skype. Their goal is to make it feel like you’re actually learning in Italy.
There’s a general language course, a conversation course (for intermediate to advanced learners), an exam prep course and a business Italian course. Before you commit, Learn Italian Online provides free 20-minute trial lessons. You then have the opportunity to change teachers if you find that the one you’re working with doesn’t quite suit your needs.
It should be noted that lessons on this site are processed in euros, so students outside of Europe should consult with the staff before moving forward.
Verbalplanet is a site built specifically around Skype language lessons. The website’s program includes over 30 languages to choose from, including Italian.
Classes by Verbalplanet are taught by native speakers who are also professional language educators. There’s a particular focus on learning through conversation, as well as customizable lesson options.
Verbalplanet may be an especially good option for people who have busy schedules or work unconventional hours. You’ll be able to see tutors’ full schedules so you can find lesson times that work for you. Not only that, the lesson plan itself will be personalized based on your language goals.
Even wary students can book a free trial lesson before investing in an entire plan.
Cost: Around $22 per lesson (price varies per teacher)
coLanguage combines the flexibility of a Skype learning program with the quality of a traditional, university-level education. coLanguage tutors come from top schools and are all vetted, so you know you’re getting a skilled tutor.
You can browse tutor profiles to find someone whose rates, schedule and experience work for you. coLanguage also notes whether each teacher offers free trial lessons on the front of their profiles (just above the Contact button). You can quickly filter the profiles down by selecting your budget, availability, etc.
You can expect your coLanguage tutor to provide you with a range of learning materials during your Skype lessons, including exercises, audio files and videos. At the end of your training, you can even get a certificate to prove your language skills to schools or employers.
Preply focuses on studying via Skype for all sorts of topics, including language study. As of this writing, the site has nearly 300 tutors available for learning Italian.
Preply is highly customizable, giving prospective students plenty of choice in developing their lesson plan. Students are shown the wide selection of tutors available, along with loads of necessary information to help them choose the specific teacher that’s best for them.
As you’re browsing tutor profiles, you’ll see availability based on time and day of the week, whether or not the teacher is a native speaker, payment rates, the amount of lessons available and a brief autobiography. Preply also has a review option, which gives students the chance to see what their fellow students have to say about each instructor.
If you’re having trouble fitting online Italian lessons into your schedule, Babbel may be an excellent resource for you. This popular course offers quick, 15-minute lessons that you can complete at your own pace.
In addition, Babbel focuses primarily on conversational Italian, which is an important skill to hone once you’ve reached an intermediate level.
Babbel lets you learn at your pace, so it’s a great option if you want to build your Italian skills and knowledge in a flexible way. You’ll be able to develop a routine using the program, which is key to improving your skills at a steady rate.
Don’t be thrown off by this program’s name. They also offer Italian courses online!
The online courses are taught by native Italian teachers. You learn privately through live e-lessons with your teacher. They even offer flexible schedules for your convenience.
In their Advanced 1 and Advanced 2 courses, you learn Italian grammar, syntax and communication. They also include Italian culture and history in the curriculum.
Not only does this make their lessons more engaging, it also gives you a deeper understanding of everyday life in Italy.
As the name hints, Memrise’s goal is to make Italian memorization manageable and even enjoyable. The lessons are comprised of flashcard-like exercises, animated games and more.
Plus, one of Memrise’s newer features is Grammabot, a chatbot that teaches grammar to improve your fluency. They also have two review options: classic and speed review.
They offer several diverse lessons for higher-level Italian. For example:
The first two are official Memrise courses designed to teach you complicated conversation topics, turns of phrases and advanced vocabulary.
The others are community courses (created by other users), which are great for creative themes and uncommon terms—just be mindful of the fact that they’re not official course content.
The excellent course platform edX is an online learning resource and MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) spot that offers hundreds of courses on nearly every subject through some of the world’s most prestigious colleges and universities.
This course is just one of the many Italian learning options offered on the platform.
Italian Language and Culture is a free, 8-week self-paced course offered through Wellesley College.
The course uses a variety of techniques to teach advanced language skills, including authentic content videos that show Italian students participating in daily campus activities, downloadable podcasts, reading materials and actual video lessons with a teacher.
There’s an emphasis on Italian culture, as well. Materials cover the Italian socio-economic issues in current headlines, theater and literature.
Rosetta Stone is an immersive language-learning program that uses a combination of speech recognition, native speakers and vocabulary-building exercises to build your Italian knowledge.
It has courses designed for various levels of language learners, including an advanced Italian program.
This interactive online course requires a subscription and teaches through a series of lessons designed to bring learners up to a C1 level of proficiency on the CEFR scale.
The course contains all the content offered on Rosetta Stone’s CD program, but it’s accessible from a computer, tablet or phone, so it’s mobile and suitable for tight schedules.
There’s a placement test to determine where to begin in the course. Additionally, there’s a free trial offer to test whether or not it’s the right course for you!
This free advanced course from Italy Made Easy consists of eight lessons centered around the YouTube series of the same name.
The course takes these videos and turns them into a thorough curriculum with comprehension exercises and quizzes to make sure you really understand the content.
Italy Made Easy has a collection of other courses for various levels. Besides the course, check out the interactive forums on the site, where users and native Italian speakers can chat and help each other by answering questions.
A basic account is free and gives learners a taste of the overall course. But even if you don’t choose to join, there are even more YouTube videos on their channel that are useful and absolutely free!
Rocket Italian Platinum is the most advanced Italian course Rocket Languages offers. It teaches using interactive audio tracks that cover topics such as socializing, culture, food and Italian culture and travel.
Each of the 29 audio lessons is about 25 minutes long and comes with a written transcript so you can follow along. Conversations are divided into chunks, which are translated and explained with accompanying grammar notes.
The lessons are held by native Italian speakers and are spoken at a slightly slowed-down speed with clear pronunciation so you can understand every little word!
Learners get to pick and choose their curriculum from the topics available to structure an individualized learning program. This way, you can learn about what interests you and work toward your own personal learning goal.
Cyber Italian is an all-around excellent resource for learning Italian. Each of their 20 advanced lessons is jam-packed with audio, culture information, exercises and quizzes.
Grammar and vocabulary are taught by first listening to dialogue. You’ll see the transcript on one side of the screen and the verbs you’ll encounter (plus their meanings) on the other side.
In the grammar section of each lesson, several grammatical forms are explained and given more context. Each lesson ends with a quiz to test your knowledge.
And if 20 lessons aren’t enough, they have recipes, songs, book excerpts and games to expand your Italian knowledge.
I know you love to read for fun, but sometimes it’s good to see how much of a text you comprehend.
Italy Magazine provides free advanced-level texts to read and then tests your understanding with a series of questions. Correct answers are revealed by clicking on the question.
This is a great source of news about Italian culture and current events. You can also find dual-language articles here to further improve your reading skills.
Liber Liber is a website dedicated to Italian literature. While it doesn’t necessarily offer lessons, it’s still a wonderful resource for improving your Italian reading and listening comprehension.
This site offers a selection of free e-books and audiobooks that allow you to download both files—giving you the opportunity to read the text while listening to the narrator.
These books are all classics of Italian literature and reading and listening to them simultaneously can make the language a little less overwhelming.
Plus, there’s the added bonus of knowing that words are pronounced correctly! To perfect your own pronunciation, go back and read a portion of the text along with the narrator.
How to Gauge Your Italian Learning Needs
It’s important to know where your abilities lie, so you know where to take the next step in your Italian studies.
While it may be hard to judge your proficiency when you’re teaching yourself, there are some ways to help you figure it out.
Look at the main rubrics of language learning: reading, writing, speaking and listening.
Where are your skills strongest? Where are there gaps in your abilities? Can you respond to a question you hear, or pronounce words out loud as you read?
Questions like this help you know where you need the most work, and therefore what you need from an advanced Italian course.
If you’re looking for advanced online Italian lessons, you’re already taking an important step toward fluency.
But it’s important to supplement your learning with outside resources for truly balanced skills that continue to grow.
Here’s how:
Practice every day: You know what they say—use it or lose it! Make sure you dedicate regular time to Italian practice. Schedule it into your calendar to keep yourself accountable. Even though you’re at an advanced level, you still need to work to keep your language muscles in shape.
Use your favorite media: Watching Italian TV, reading books, listening to music, etc. lets you learn more casual and common Italian than the proper lessons you would find in a textbook. As an advanced learner, using these learning channels gives you an opportunity to relax a little and enjoy yourself, while still practicing your skill and even learning new things.
Find native speakers: Is there anyone in your area that speaks Italian? Try the Italian language department at your local university, for example. Invite them for a coffee so you can get to know them while practicing your speech! You’ll get firsthand help and advice, plus the chance to make a new friend.
Travel: When you visit Italy, you can completely immerse yourself in the language. Read newspapers, talk to locals and eavesdrop at coffee shops to practice and advance your Italian capabilities. You can also do fun activities like taking cooking classes or local tours. As an advanced learner, jumping into a full Italian experience will give you innumerable chances to apply your knowledge. This type of total immersion is a great step towards full fluency.
As you progress in Italian, there will always be new challenges popping up.
But, as long as you work every day to keep your skills in practice, you’ll make it to the highest level: fluency!
