Inside Duolingo: Secrets Behind Streak Success

"Animations that are cool and that cause you to like really soak it in... All of that comes together to make you really focus on that moment."

• Visual effects and haptics enrich the user interface.
• Celebratory animations reinforce positive user behaviors.
• Enhancing moments of achievement increases user enjoyment.

"If you're going to run this many experiments, you have to be really process-oriented and really thoughtful about which experiments am I going to run when... There's heavy Jira automation."

• Process and planning are crucial for high-volume testing.
• Clear roadmaps help coordinate design, engineering, and product.
• Efficient workflows allow rapid learning and iteration.

"We tried... to make it even easier to extend your streak... and D A Us moved not one bit... We had dumbed down the unit of... no one thinks about, I just want to come, you do one question on Duolingo."

• Simplifying too much can reduce user engagement.
• Not all hypotheses lead to positive outcomes.
• Failures provide valuable insights for future improvements.

"It ships a disgusting amount of DAUs... It is our one of our golden geese."

• The streak feature drives daily active users (DAUs) substantially.
• Features that encourage habit formation enhance retention.
• Leveraging key features can create substantial business value.

"All of our changes at Duolingo go through product review that are reviewed by Luis... They have a really high product bar and so that helps."

• Founder reviews every product change to maintain quality.
• Leadership oversight prevents feature bloat and misalignment.
• Strong product vision guides consistent user experiences.

"You kind of got to hold the line at some point... We can almost always get engagement wins up to a certain point by just cheapening the streak, making it easier to extend... but you kind of got to hold the line."

• Duolingo avoids overcomplicating features for short-term gains.
• Preserving core values maintains long-term user engagement.
• Leadership ensures features grow without diluting product quality.

"We really resist the urge to do the big V1... Having that clear metric of we’re trying to drive CUR, not we’re trying to just make this feature better helps at least make sure you know, give the team clear marching orders."

• Teams focus on specific metrics like retention (CUR).
• This focus ensures efforts target the highest ROI opportunities.
• Metric-driven teams align product development with business goals.

"The more that we can make the feature easily comprehensible to users, the more retentive it is."

• Simplifying features helps users grasp their purpose quickly.
• Clear design reduces confusion and enhances user experience.
• Focusing on clarity can lead to significant retention improvements.

"There’s so much human psychology that you all learn through all these experiments of just like how to motivate people, what motivates, what demotivates."

• Duolingo uses insights from experiments to tap into user motivations.
• Understanding loss aversion and habit formation drives retention.
• Tailoring features to psychological triggers boosts engagement.

"We’ve run in the last four years, over 600 experiments on the streak. So every other day, we’re running an experiment."

• Duolingo tests both big changes and small tweaks constantly.
• Frequent experiments reveal valuable insights into user behavior.
• Embracing a test-first approach accelerates product improvement.