Free or Cheap Hindi Learning Resources So You Can Watch Infinite Bollywood Movies
I will update this list as I learn of any more useful ones. If you want general language learning resources check out this other post. This list is Hindi specific. Find lists for other specific languages here.
For the purposes of this list "free" means something that is either totally free or has a useful free tier. "Cheap" is a subscription under $10USD a month, a software license or lifetime membership purchase under $100USD, or a book under $30USD. If you want to suggest a resource for this list please suggest ones in that price range that are of decent quality and not AI generated.
A Door Into Hindi - This website is old and a little hard to navigate but it's entirely free to use and its development was funded by the US department of education. It's a beginners foundation course with video lessons, a guide to the writing system, practice tests, and other miscellaneous resources.
Virtual Hindi - This is a website for NYU students studying Hindi but it’s free to the public. It has free lessons and PDFs for studying and reading practice.
Department of South Asian Studies at Penn State - This department website has links to a collection of supplemental materials like Hindi language websites and magazines and radio stations. Unfortunately their link to their Hindi course appears to be dead and I haven't found a surviving version of it.
INDIF - This is an educational website that has general information about India. I’ve linked to their section that has Hindi lessons for kids. This website has free worksheets and reading practice as well as cultural information about India that may interest you if you’re learning Hindi. Their blog posts and articles are also often dual language in both English and Hindi. They also have an app. (Fair warning the website is free but you might want to turn your ad blocker on)
US Foreign Service Institute Introduction to Hindi - This is FSI's only Hindi course and unfortunately there's no audio included. However, it is a complete beginner's course online for free. There's also a similar text based course available from the Peace Corps.
Language Curry - This app specializes in languages from the Indian subcontinent, including Hindi. It has beginner to upper beginner grammar lessons and themed vocabulary lists. It has a large amount of free lessons but there is still some paid content.
Invisible India Podcast - I debated whether to put this here or in the podcast part but eh it's here with the websites. This website is run by an American living in India and married to an Indian man. She has a podcast about cross cultural communication and cultural differences, free lists of Hindi learning resources, and a free blog for those learning Hindi. She also offers a lot of paid video courses for Hindi for different purposes but those tend to be fairly expensive. Her courses at or under $100 are Hindi for travel for $50, Hindi pronunciation course for $100, and the"Hindi hacks" beginners course for $80.
Learn Hindi the Easy Way - This is a free blog with tips for learners and those studying for official tests. They also have a few videos. The website is entirely in Hindi.
Watch and Learn Hindi - This channel is mainly about useful phrases and vocabulary. It discusses pronunciation, definitions, and gives example sentences.
Hindi Sumvaad - This channel hasn’t updated in a while but has a decent sized archive of beginner level Hindi lessons in conversational Hindi.
Your Hindi Coach - This channel is making a series called “learn Hindi through English” that goes over the basics and useful phrases. They are still regularly updating as of when I’m writing this.
Comprehensible Hindi - This is a comprehensible input channel mainly aimed at beginners that uses visual aids to help you understand.
The Hindi Project - This channel has lessons on specific topics and some listening practice videos with dual language subtitles.
Learn Hindi on the Go - This podcast is run by several native Hindi teachers. They have absolute beginner lessons as well as stories for listening practice. They are still regularly updating as of when I’m writing this.
Learn Hindi from Bollywood Movies - This podcast hasn’t updated in over a decade. However there’s an archive of over 120 episodes. It’s more aimed at intermediate learners and goes over quotes and songs from movies in both Hindi and English.
SBS Hindi - This is a short daily podcast from a tv network in Australia that has bite sized news stories in Hindi. The episodes are usually between 5 and 15 minutes long.
BBC Hindi Radio - The BBC has a main news podcast and several other shows in Hindi aimed at native speakers. This is likely more useful for upper intermediate to advanced learners.
Slow Interviews with Neelesh Misra - this is a podcast where Neelesh Misra interviews people slowly. He also has a channel for slow music. I’m told that Hindi learners like this podcast because most Hindi is spoken really fast.
Self study textbooks and other useful books
Reading Hindi: Novice to Intermediate - This one breaks my own rule about price because it’s $40 but there’s used copies available for cheaper and there’s just not that many graded readers in Hindi aimed at English speakers. This is a graded reader that has stories in it aimed to teach the beginner to intermediate reader a bit about Indian culture.
Elementary Hindi from Tuttle Publishing - This textbook is about $30 full price but there’s a lot of used versions available and the ebook is only about $18. I’ve heard good things about Tuttle publishing textbooks in the past, especially for Asian languages.
Master the Hindi alphabet - This is a handwriting practice workbook for those who are completely new to the Hindi script. It’s only $10 new. Used copies are available but that’s always a gamble with workbooks.
Teach Yourself Hindi - I’ve seen this one recommended a lot. It seems to be out of print but a lot of used copies are available, usually for under 20 bucks. It seems to have been rebranded as Complete Hindi at some point but those books are usually over 40 bucks. It’s also generally simple to find videos of people teaching from this textbook like in this playlist here.
Pocket Hindi Dictionary from Tuttle publishing - This is one of the cheaper dictionaries out there though Collins also has a relatively affordable one with a lot of used copies available.
Basic Hindi from McGraw Hill - This textbook is only $22 full price and has a full comprehensive guide on writing and basic grammar.
