Bloomberg Talks Duolingo CEO Luis von Ahn Talks Earnings, AI
Feb 27, 2026
Luis von Ahn, entrepreneur and computer scientist who co-founded Duolingo, discusses leveraging AI to build a fun one-on-one tutor. He talks about Duolingo’s scale and data edge, balancing short-term metrics with long-term user growth, and plans to improve teaching, expand the free experience and offer new subjects.
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AI Will Turn Duolingo Into A Tutor Like A Game
- AI will let Duolingo teach significantly better across personalization and interactivity.
- Luis Von Ahn expects an app that is as good as a one-on-one tutor and as fun as a mobile game within a few years.
Scale Gives Duolingo A Data Moat
- Duolingo's competitive advantage is scale and the learning data from billions of exercises daily.
- That proprietary data lets Duolingo train specialized models other new entrants can't easily replicate.
Habit Design Is Duolingo's Retention Engine
- Duolingo focuses on habit formation by blending game mechanics with education to keep users motivated.
- 15 million daily users have streaks longer than 365 days, showing the product's ability to sustain long-term engagement.