Yuliya Geikhman
Last updated:
6 Popular English Social Media Sites for Learners
Social media lets you connect to millions of native English speakers. I’ve rounded up six of the most popular social media websites to help you find potential language-learning friends.
Find out how to learn through these sites and what accounts you should follow.
Contents
- 1. X (Formerly Twitter)
- 2. Facebook
- 3. Instagram
- 4. TikTok
- 5. Pinterest
- 6. Tumblr
- And One More Thing...
Download: This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you can take anywhere. Click here to get a copy. (Download)
1. X (Formerly Twitter)
Many X conversations use abbreviations—shortenings of words. Some tweets leave out words so that the tweet still makes sense, but isn’t really grammatically correct. Keep this in mind if you’re trying to learn correct English grammar and spelling.
X is good for practicing conversations—you can join casual conversations, practice your everyday speaking skills, express your opinions in English and feel more confident about entering conversations in the real world as a result.
To join a big conversation, users include hashtags in their posts. Hashtags are words or phrases that come after the # symbol and are used as tags so that people can search for topics.
Use hashtags to search for things like #english or #firstdates. You can find a list of tags that are popular right now under the “Trends” heading when you log into X.
Top X Pages for English Learners:
- Thousands of learner friendly videos (especially beginners)
- Handpicked, organized, and annotated by FluentU's experts
- Integrated into courses for beginners
@HappyEnglishNY: This X account, run by a private English teacher, shares common English sayings and how to use them in everyday conversations. The tweets are informative and friendly, always asking questions to encourage interaction.
#Twinglish: Use this tag to practice your English on X. Searching for this tag on X will display many other English learners practicing English. To join in and write your own English tweets, include #twinglish at the end of your sentence before posting. Another similar tag is #EngPls.
2. Facebook
Unlike X, there’s no limit on how much you write on Facebook, so you can have long and interesting discussions about any topic. You could write a whole English essay and post it on your Facebook page.
Many people use Facebook to connect with their friends and family, but there are a lot of resources on Facebook for English learners.
Facebook has pages and groups for almost any topic you can imagine. Follow pages that cover topics you’re interested in, or follow groups that have discussions and share links to interesting web pages about the topic. Don’t be afraid to join the conversations in the comments!
Practice your English skills by writing your own status updates in English. Share something interesting, a funny picture or a question that’s on your mind. You might begin a great conversation.
- Interactive subtitles: click any word to see detailed examples and explanations
- Slow down or loop the tricky parts
- Show or hide subtitles
- Review words with our powerful learning engine
Top Facebook Pages for Learners:
LearnEnglish — British Council: This Facebook page has many excellent links, English practice questions and other useful posts. A lot of the posts are focused on history and culture, allowing you to practice English through interesting topics.
VOA Learning English: Learn English through news and current events (things that are happening around the world and in America right now). Voice of America’s English learning page shares news articles, videos, fun phrases and useful words for English learners.
3. Instagram
This platform is perfect for visual learners and those who appreciate the power of storytelling.
You can follow English language teachers, enthusiasts, and learners who share language tips, daily expressions, and language challenges.
Many Instagram users post in English and provide valuable language content in their captions and stories. It’s an excellent way to pick up new vocabulary, idiomatic expressions, and contemporary slang.
- Learn words in the context of sentences
- Swipe left or right to see more examples from other videos
- Go beyond just a superficial understanding
Additionally, Instagram offers features like live streams, allowing you to engage in real-time conversations with native English speakers. You can ask questions, discuss various topics, and even participate in language challenges to put your skills to the test!
Top Instagram Accounts for Learners:
#LearnEnglish, #EnglishVocabulary and #EnglishTips: you can explore these English-themed hashtags to find lots of useful language-related content.
@inenglishwithlove: this account is run by an English teacher who uses inspirational quotes and beautiful designs to offer you English tips and teach lots of interesting language, grammar and phrases.
4. TikTok
You can find TikTok creators dedicated to teaching English, sharing daily language tips, and conducting fun language challenges. These short videos often focus on pronunciation, idiomatic expressions, and conversational English.
It’s an ideal platform for improving your listening skills and getting accustomed to different English accents and dialects.
Start building sentences.
- FluentU builds you up, so you can build sentences on your own
- Start with multiple-choice questions and advance through sentence building to producing your own output
- Go from understanding to speaking in a natural progression.
TikTok’s interactive features, such as duets and comments, enable you to engage with content creators and fellow learners. You can participate in pronunciation challenges, vocabulary quizzes, and language discussions.
Top TikTok Accounts for Learners:
@english.with.lucy: Lucy is a British teacher and she goes through different topics on her page such as idioms, accents, vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, and even fluency.
@englishunderstood: another great resource for anyone who wants to improve their English language skills, specifically when it comes to conversations. The videos are casual, engaging and very informative.
5. Pinterest
Pinterest is a different kind of social media website. Instead of sharing words and comments, Pinterest is for sharing interesting links and pictures. It’s made for showing other people the cool stuff you find around the internet. Pinterest is great if you’re a visual learner—someone who learns from looking at pictures instead of reading or listening.
A lot of people use Pinterest to collect recipes, fun art projects, cool crafts (homemade items) and any other nice-looking websites or projects. Another group of people who love Pinterest are teachers.
- Images, examples, video examples, and tips
- Covering all the tricky edge cases, eg.: phrases, idioms, collocations, and separable verbs
- No reliance on volunteers or open source dictionaries
- 100,000+ hours spent by FluentU's team to create and maintain
Yes, teachers love Pinterest. Many teachers on Pinterest love to share their resources for teaching English as a Second Language (ESL) classes, so it’s easy to find great worksheets, handouts and interactive websites.
Pinterest isn’t as good for having conversations as Twitter and Facebook, so it’s better for those times when you just want to learn something new, discover a new website or play a new online game that will help you build your English skills.
You can create your own Pinterest boards and save your favorite blogs, pictures and interesting online resources to them. Your boards can be your online notebook!
Top Pinterest Pages for Learners:
How do you do? Learn English Every Day!: This account has a wonderful collection of words and sayings, organized by topic and paired with great pictures and definitions. It’s a visual dictionary, and although it isn’t complete, it’s a nice way to learn some new words through pictures.
We Learn English: This page is an excellent collection of cartoons, worksheets and other visual ways to learn. There’s a lot of information here, most of it presented in a colorful and memorable way. You might want to choose something specific to look for before browsing the more than 1,600 pins (and counting), because the information isn’t organized in any way. Idioms—sayings that can’t be literally translated—are a great place to start!
Writing Prompts: Pinterest is all about finding inspiration in art, and this board is a perfect example of that. Practice your English writing skills by writing responses to the many images collected on this board. Each image has a suggestion for what to write, but it’s really up to you—what does the prompt make you feel, think, hear or smell?
I started FluentU to build a new kind of language app. Want to learn more about how FluentU got started?
6. Tumblr
Tumblr is a blog that is usually used as a public diary—a place where people can write about things they find interesting and share their thoughts with others. Tumblr can be used for writing and sharing all kinds of online content, so you can find some great articles, photos, videos and pictures.
Leaving a comment on Tumblr is a nice way to show the blogger that you took the time to read or look at their work. Many of the posts invite readers to respond with their opinions on the topic. You can get into some great discussions on Tumblr.
An even better way to use Tumblr is to start your own blog. It’s easy to start and customize your page to your own style. You can get a lot of practice by writing daily or even just once a week. Write about your day, your favorite TV show or anything else you want.
Top Tumblr Pages for Learners:
Idiom Land: If you want to know English idioms, Idiom Land is the Tumblr page for you. This blog posts cards with pictures and sometimes videos of idioms. It always gives great definitions and shows you how to use the featured idioms.
The Language Boutique: This blog posts vocabulary words with graphics and charts that make them more memorable. Sometimes you get a simple word and definition, but often there are lists of similar/opposite words, expressions that use the word, etc.
The power of the internet is at your fingertips.
Have some conversations, make some friends and learn English in the process!
Download: This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you can take anywhere. Click here to get a copy. (Download)
And One More Thing...
If you like learning English through movies and online media, you should also check out FluentU. FluentU lets you learn English from popular talk shows, catchy music videos and funny commercials, as you can see here:
If you want to watch it, the FluentU app has probably got it.
The FluentU app and website makes it really easy to watch English videos. There are captions that are interactive. That means you can tap on any word to see an image, definition, and useful examples.
FluentU lets you learn engaging content with world famous celebrities.
For example, when you tap on the word "searching," you see this:
FluentU lets you tap to look up any word.
Learn all the vocabulary in any video with quizzes. Swipe left or right to see more examples for the word you’re learning.
FluentU helps you learn fast with useful questions and multiple examples. Learn more.
The best part? FluentU remembers the vocabulary that you’re learning. It gives you extra practice with difficult words—and reminds you when it’s time to review what you’ve learned. You have a truly personalized experience.
Start using the FluentU website on your computer or tablet or, better yet, download the FluentU app from the iTunes or Google Play store. Click here to take advantage of our current sale! (Expires at the end of this month.)
