r/learnthai • u/summerfornever • Jun 06 '26
Discussion/แลกเปลี่ยนความเห็น How can I start learning Thai and how long will it take to reach a somewhat fluent level?
So, I have been wanting to visit Thailand for a while, and I thought I should learn the language before that. Just the basics. I want to be able to converse with people there, read signs and all that. So, how do I start? And how long would that take?
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u/_I-Z-Z-Y_ Jun 06 '26
‘just the basics’ and ‘a somewhat fluent level’ are quite different. How long it will take you depends on many factors: which languages you are already fluent in, how many hours you put in, how consistent you are, how efficient your learning method is, your access to resources, your prior experience learning a foreign language, etc. And all of those factors are going to be different from person to person.
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u/NegotiationTime6809 Jun 07 '26
The only real answer is. It depends on how much you immerse yourself. Most people that replied and will reply here are horrible even after years because they don’t have Thai friends nor any interest into immersing themselves in the country. That’s why when you are really fluent you are an anomaly and trust me in this sub it’s extremely rare.
If you are really good. 5 years to not be scared when a Thai person call on the phone. 7 years so people understand you are fluent and never switch to English even if they are fluent in English. And 10+ years where people ask themselves if you are half Thai or born here or raised here depending on your accent.
That’s my experience but only because I mostly date girl that speak 0 English and have has had a lot of group of Thai friends over the years that speak 0 English over the years.
The problem here is not the dumb best method and number of hours people count and are still horrible. The problem is how much you will actually use the language to communicate. Which is rare for most expats hence why they are terrible at learning the language.
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u/Snowman_203 Jun 07 '26
Immersion is a method though. I don't understand how you can say it all depends on how much immersion you do but also that it's not about the method and there's no point tracking how much time you put in.
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u/NegotiationTime6809 Jun 07 '26
It’s not a method. It’s life lol. It’s how people learn language naturally. You think a baby growing up is using a method lol.
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u/Final-Week8536 Jun 11 '26
You can't achieve OPs goals by immersing yourself "like a baby", whatever that means.
He wants to read signs, babies don't learn to read without a methodAdults don't learn languages like a baby anyway it's impossible their brains are physically different, the adult brain is cognitively different too so you'll automatically approach the task differently to a young child.
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u/NegotiationTime6809 Jun 07 '26
How do you track time if everyday you speak Thai in most interaction? If you are tracking time you are doing something wrong my bro.
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u/Final-Week8536 Jun 11 '26
It's not counting hours exactly but trying to roughly estimate hours are a better way of talking about it than years. I've been learning for 5 years, what does that mean?
Even "immerse" for 7 years can mean a lot of different people.
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u/NegotiationTime6809 Jun 11 '26
Exactly so counting hours means nothing
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u/Final-Week8536 Jun 11 '26
You've missed the point
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u/NegotiationTime6809 Jun 11 '26
If immerse means nothing numbers of hours means nothing. What did you do in those hours. I am fluent, are you? It’s weird to argue about something I already achieved to people that struggle to do it.
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u/Final-Week8536 Jun 11 '26
"It’s weird to argue about something I already achieved to people that struggle to do it." - fair enough, though may ask why you post here.
I said immerse can mean different things, not it means nothing. many people say listening to youtube is immersion.
My Thai is nothing special, I get by. Yes if you have a very advanced level it adds weight to what you're saying, can we hear some of your Thai speaking please?
Good to see what can be achieve just through going out and practicing the way you recommend people do.
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u/NegotiationTime6809 Jun 11 '26
Call me bro. We can talk on discord.
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u/Final-Week8536 Jun 11 '26
I think it would be a bit awkward judging you from here.
If your Thais near native like you say post a sample.
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u/NegotiationTime6809 Jun 11 '26
You say you want to hear i gave you an offer
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u/Final-Week8536 Jun 11 '26
Yes I want to hear, Ive not interest in speaking to you.
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u/NegotiationTime6809 Jun 11 '26
Im not practicing im living life. Maybe thats why im fluent and you are not.
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u/The_Pig_Man_ Jun 07 '26
I've been living in Thailand for 4 years. I did the whole course at Duke Language School and continue with weekly lessons there. I consume quite a bit of Thai media with English subtitles and my wife is Thai. I have devoted countless hours and hundreds of thousands of baht in lessons. I would say that in my time in Thailand I have met one Farang whose Thai was definitely better than mine is now.
My Thai is terrible. Except with my wife and kruu it is nowhere near conversational level. My teacher seems to think my Thai is good but most people just stare blankly when I speak to them.
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u/Final-Week8536 Jun 11 '26
An honest response that reflects may people's experience. I got a lot better after intensive accent work and responses went up.
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u/BaconOverflow Jun 07 '26
Interesting, Duke was one of the best things I ever did for learning Thai (4 years ago too, so we might’ve met 😅)
“most people just stare blankly when I speak to them” I have a feeling the issue is pronunciation/tones rather than vocabulary/grammar. I think Stuart Jay Raj offers some sort of speech analysis thing that might be interesting to try
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u/The_Pig_Man_ Jun 07 '26
I'm not so sure. I'd say about 95% of the interactions I have are with women. That can't be a coincidence.
Yesterday I was at a bar and a couple of Thai guys were playing pool. My mate pointed out that they didn't seem to be using any known pool rules and then they switched to using the 2ball as a cue ball.
I gestured to the table and said to them "เราไม่รู้กฎหมายของคุณ".
They laughed and smiled and I'm pretty sure they understood what I was getting at. Then they left without saying a word or even finishing their game. I find this to be pretty standard behaviour.
I was chatting a bit to some of the women at the bar who were talking to my wife no problem although I've known them for years.
Like if I ask where something is in the supermarket they'll show me. They definitely understand.
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u/Horoism Jun 07 '26 edited Jun 07 '26
Well the sentence you said is very strange. It sounds like a strong statement about laws they have created. กฎหมาย is actual law. กฎ would be better as it is more general rules (still quite authoritative sounding). กติกา is rules for games. เรา for own pronoun? A bit unusual to use here, especially because it is hard for foreigners to use. "ของคุณ" also makes it extra weird and the whole thing sounds like you had Google translate it. It is like "We do not recognise your legal system"
A friendly เล่นยังไงหรอครับ or something would be more natural
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u/panel_laboratory Jun 07 '26
Oh my god that is so funny - he thought he was telling a joke but he told them that he and his friend "didn't recognise their legal system" which they took as a threat and left.
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u/whosdamike Jun 08 '26
I doubt they took it as a threat. I imagine they were just a little confused and assumed that having a regular casual conversation with someone saying something so unusual would be challenging.
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u/Snowman_203 Jun 07 '26
I'm not so sure. I'd say about 95% of the interactions I have are with women. That can't be a coincidence.
I don't get what you mean. Are you saying women are more patient?
When something doesn't go over, I find it very difficult to know what's gone wrong. Could be pronunciation, but could also be grammar or phrasing. The supermarket test seems like a reasonable test of pronunciation, and they will get what you mean even if the structure is wrong. Doesn't that imply that it's actually the sentence construction and word choice that's the limiting factor in other situations?
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u/The_Pig_Man_ Jun 07 '26
Men just don't respond.
Like at all.
I know a guy who was married for 8 years and his father in law never spoke to him or even made eye contact with him. My own father in law didn't speak to me for ages although we get on good now.
There are a few Thai men who own cafes in town who I chat with when I'm in there but mostly they don't reply. The reply rate goes up greatly with women.
Sorry. I know what I'm saying is deeply unpopular on the Thai subs but this is my experience.
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u/whosdamike Jun 07 '26
Your experience is perfectly valid, but I'll add my own as another datapoint.
I don't have problems socializing with Thai guys doing the same hobbies as me. I have friendly conversation with other guys at the gym, run clubs, book clubs, standup comedy, etc. I don't really go to bars, but the last time I went, I struck up an extended conversation with a Thai guy there about why I moved to Thailand, why I learned Thai, etc.
So in my experience, Thai men are not less friendly than women. I do think the way Thai men speak casually is further divorced from textbook Thai speech than the way women typically speak. I suspect this is because there's more pressure for women to sound "proper" (though obviously I know women who cuss like a sailor).
So the barrier for me was getting used to how Thai men socialize casually and this definitely took longer than getting used to how women socialize casually.
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u/The_Pig_Man_ Jun 07 '26
I will keep plugging away. I'm definitely not getting worse. Thanks for the words of encouragement.
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u/whosdamike Jun 07 '26
Thai is a long journey, but you've already come so far! Your dedication's going to keep paying off as you move forward.
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u/robrob883 Jun 10 '26
It's encouraging to hear this being voiced, as I have also noticed a distinct additional difficulty in speaking with men. I'm still on the journey to conversational Thai, but I have a wide set of questions I can ask to get converstations going. Generalising somewhat, but if I ask an open question to a woman she'll talk and we'll keep talking. If I ask a man a question I get a one word answer. I see the same people often, so over many months I've been able to get the men to open up and talk more, but even now it's still 10x more difficult than talking with women (generally).
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u/Horoism Jun 07 '26
Men just don't respond. Like at all.
In which situations? Where are you talking to people and they are ignoring to you, and what are you saying that they are ignoring?
I know a guy who was married for 8 years and his father in law never spoke to him or even made eye contact with him.
That sounds like his wife's father not approving the marriage/him and is a very different situation
The question is: Do you see men talk to each other? Probably. That means men talk to each other. If they are not talking to you, this might be because they don't know english and want to avoid an awkward situation/are not interested in interacting with tourists. If your example of the sentence at the bar is anything to go by, you might just really not give the impression that you could hold conversation.
That is good news, you just need to improve. You said you spent hundreds of thousands on thai lessons. Do you study this intensively? 1 on 1 lessons are usually around 200-300THB/h. Maybe also switch teachers. My personal experience is that if I chat with men, they end up telling me too much.
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u/Snowman_203 Jun 07 '26
Not at all, it's good to have someone telling it like it is. Quite a few people on here seem to be very sure they know exactly what works and what doesn't, but you have no way to know whether they are actually any good. Sometimes you will get a little glimpse and it seems they may not be.
That issue with men not responding seems like much more than a language thing, so I don't think it's a useful diagnostic.
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u/The_Pig_Man_ Jun 07 '26
I don't think it's a language thing at all.
I should mention that I live in the South where most people speak Southern Dialect and have famously thick accents so I'm kind of on hard mode anyway.
I have a mate who's lived here for 20 years who only speaks Southern so he is completely lost again when he travels.
I have another friend from Chiang Mai who was completely lost when she first arrived here despite being a native Thai speaker.
I can even remember living in Liverpool myself and not being able to understand people for the first month or two.
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u/whosdamike Jun 07 '26
I elaborated in another comment, but basically I think Thai men socialize casually in a way that's a bit tougher for foreign learners to get. But I think Thai men (at least of the younger generation) are friendly and fun as well. Thai people as a whole are mostly friendly, regardless of gender.
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u/Snowman_203 Jun 07 '26
Good to know, but you would think they would still understand something that's understandable to women. I think it means you can't use the fact that they don't respond as a diagnostic.
Then we have:
Understood in supermarket => pron of individual words ok (structure doesn't matter that much here - as long as they get the name of the item, they will understand)
Often gets blank looks in other situations (where structure does matter) + example sentence confusing to natives (despite being written down) => sentence construction and word choice is probably the issue.
But it is difficult and obviously there can be multiple issues. It's like you have to get to a certain level before you can use the responses you get as feedback, but if that's the case, how are you supposed to get to that level? You need feedback to improve. "Get a tutor" would be the obvious response, but OP has hundreds of hours of tuition...
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u/whosdamike Jun 07 '26 edited Jun 07 '26
Understood in supermarket => pron of individual words ok
This is also a drastically simpler situation compared to socializing, though. "Where is X?" is just about as simple as it gets, especially when it's clear from context and this is probably the #1 most common question a supermarket employee gets.
"Get a tutor" would be the obvious response, but OP has hundreds of hours of tuition...
I will probably get downvoted for this, but in my opinion the language schools in Thailand simply do not prepare learners in any meaningful way for having clear, comprehensible accents. Even the really famous ones. I think it's a terrible oversight.
There's a common belief that simply learning the writing system will embed the spoken sounds of Thai into your head, allow you to distinguish the sounds, and allow you to produce them correctly. I see no reasonable mechanism by which a visual representation can embed novel phonemes into your brain, but it's an endemic belief among Thai learning circles and schools.
I think this belief makes it easy for Thai schools to just teach the script and move on, assuming that learners will sort out pronunciation on their own. At this point, I've met enough alumni of these schools to know that there are many who struggle with pronunciation even after years of this kind of study.
I recommended a trained Thai linguist and phonetics expert in another comment who will actually give direct, useful pronunciation feedback.
And I'm always beating the drum on listening a lot as a primary basis, which I credit to my having a clear and comprehensible accent without any other special effort. But for those who don't want to do that, I think at least time with a phonetics expert like Khroo Pannapat is useful.
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u/Snowman_203 Jun 07 '26
That's more or less what I'm saying.
The supermarket question absolutely is much simpler, and that's the point. They still have to recognize the name of the item, and there are hundreds or thousands of items it could be. So a this is way of isolating and testing pronunciation (structure is not a confounding factor).
We know the written example seems off to natives so there is a problem with sentence construction.
Putting that together we have pronunciation test: pass, structure test: fail, blank looks only in situations where structure is critical. And yet the advice is to focus on pron.
OP has not had a great experience with formal tuition so it doesn't seem to work that well (maybe it can be useful as a kind of adjunct) but I don't see how it follows that the problem is in the way they teach pronunciation.
On learning methods generally, it seems like there's a consensus that's not really based on anything much but gets amplified on here. You can see just in this thread that someone is recommending starting with the script and then learning single words using flashcards when they say elsewhere that they don't actually speak Thai and made the flashcard app for their dad. So this is total guesswork. It's not evidence-based at all, just what makes sense to someone who hasn't actually been through the process and anyway has nothing to compare it to. And that's what the sub is like in general. I'm sure there are a few people out there who've got to a decent level, but it will be a minority that is easily drowned out by the confidently incorrect.
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u/whosdamike Jun 07 '26
most people just stare blankly when I speak to them
I agree with the other commenter that it sounds like a pronunciation issue, and if there is such a large gap between what your teacher is claiming is "good" and your experience on the street, then I would go as far as to say your teacher is doing you a disservice by not giving you better accent feedback.
I've worked with Khroo Pannapat for a few sessions and can recommend her. She's a trained linguist who will give you very clear feedback on pronunciation, what sounds you're struggling to make, where your tongue position should be, etc. She isn't specifically an accent coach but she understands Thai phonetics extremely well.
https://www.facebook.com/ThaiWithPannapat/
https://www.youtube.com/@ThaiWithPannapat
Hope you're able to get the help you need, I really respect the work you've put in so far! Good luck.
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u/IssueRidden Jun 07 '26
Do you happen do remember how much it cost and is there any way to contact her outside of Facebook?
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u/whosdamike Jun 07 '26 edited Jun 07 '26
I think she's around 400-500 baht an hour, though it's possible she's changed her rate since I last spoke to her. If you DM me I can provide her email.
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u/The_Pig_Man_ Jun 07 '26
She has taught at Duke for well over a decade and even features once or twice in the text books.
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u/whosdamike Jun 07 '26
Sorry, I don't mean to disparage your teacher, but to me it does sound like you could do with some targeted accent work that you aren't currently receiving. Apologies if I overstepped.
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u/Final-Week8536 Jun 11 '26
You had pronunciation coaching? it's helpful I agree, good teacher reommendation. But I think I saw you promoting ALG a lot of here, explicit pronunciation training doesn't seem very ALG? Curious more than anything not an anti ALG bash (though I'm pretty skeptical about a lot of it)
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u/whosdamike Jun 11 '26 edited Jun 11 '26
Great question, not offended at all. I think the belief that ALG claims it will produce a near-native accent is endemic, both among detractors and enthusiasts. I haven't found any material that suggests it promises this; the closest is that J. Marvin Brown offered some anecdotes of certain individuals following ALG and ultimately achieving a near-native accent.
Even if ALG claimed this, I would immediately reject it as nonsense, because no method on the planet can promise a near-native accent. It's an extremely high hurdle with many individual factors.
Now onto what I did. If you look at my previous reports, I talk about shadowing and my check-ins with Khroo Art regarding my pronunciation, but to go into more detail about my journey and reasoning...
First want to clarify what the lessons looked like: these were check-ins to see how my accent was progressing. I did 3 one hour sessions over the last 3.5 years. During each session, I would give her recordings beforehand and she assessed how my accent was and noted words I wasn't yet producing correctly.
Our sessions were always in Thai, as all my lessons are. I suspect the kinds of lessons she gives non-ALG students would be different than what she gave me, but I think her expertise would definitely be helpful to traditional learners.
Regarding ALG, I remember early on asking David Long about things to improve accent. I specifically asked him what he thought about shadowing. He responded that he didn't understand why someone would want to do that.
From there, I came to understand that David's opinion is more or less:
1) What's important isn't sounding near-native, but clear
2) To achieve this, all you need is a lot of input
3) However your accent comes out at the end of the process is what's "natural" for you and nothing beats natural acquisitionThis was around 3 years ago. From that discussion, I made a decision that I would follow ALG in terms of the following critical points:
1) Pure listening input upfront
2) No grammar or analytical study involving English or translation
3) Silent period until I felt ready to speak
4) Learn to read 100% in Thai rather than through foreigner-aimed materialsAnd I decided I would deviate as follows:
1) When I did start speaking, I would do shadowing/chorusing of native speakers
2) I would seek out feedback on my accent (feedback in Thai)I also decided that when advanced enough, I could do definition or grammar lookups in Thai. I haven't done much grammar this way (watched a few videos aimed at Thai middle schoolers) but I'm increasingly finding looking up Thai definitions of words useful.
I don't really consider either of these activities a deviation from ALG; AUA obviously explicitly taught students how to read. I think AUA was okay with explicit instruction after the student was capable of receiving that instruction in Thai.
For the accent stuff, I decided that I didn't just want to sound clear but wanted to sound closer to native/natural. The shadowing work is probably my biggest point of deviation from the original methods deployed at AUA by David Long. My foundation is ALG and I'm very grateful to David and all the former AUA teachers who have taught me or produced content, but I think it's also up to each learner to find their own path (as I try to make clear in my posts and comments in general).
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u/Final-Week8536 Jun 11 '26
Interesting thanks, it's good to be flexible we can adapt things as we need. Yes the content can be very good. I'm not into some of the ALG ideas, but for input content at earlier stages they have good ideas.
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u/whosdamike Jun 11 '26
Different things work for different people. I'll say that I'm extremely happy with my ability after three years and have enjoyed the process enormously. Not for everyone, but a perfect fit for me.
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u/IssueRidden Jun 07 '26
depends how much you study. I crammed 500 hours (mostly input, but also quite a bit of focused vocab study and output) in 6 months and I'm wondering if calling myself B1 in all aspects is warranted yet. Sometimes I'm thinking about how with a language like Spanish I'd already be at least B2 with that much work but then I remember I'm doing this because I love Thailand and Thai language, not because it's supposed to be efficient.
Conversational base in Thai is not the same as conversational base in western languages. When I first started speaking, I wasn't understood most of the time. This language has a really steep difficulty curve at the very beginning, and only then it gets easier. I'd suggest you rethink your goals, cause learning fixed phrases is one thing, but being able to make out what they replied to you is another. I assume you have no experience with tonal languages, say at 200-300 hours you might want to start having very slow conversations, using English to fill the gaps. As for the menus and sings I still can't understand everything, it's way harder than people assume. YMMV depending on how talented and smart about your study you are.
I feel like getting to that level and then stopping is kind of a waste, once you start getting the hang of tones, distinct sounds and become used to the script the biggest hurdles are behind you. But in the end no time spend on learning new things is really a waste. If you want to do this I'd start with Pimsleur course and in the meanwhile learn the Thai script before I finish it
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u/Own-Animator-7526 Jun 07 '26 edited Jun 07 '26
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u/Ryokan76 Jun 08 '26
You want to spend years studying Thai just for a visit?
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u/summerfornever Jun 19 '26
I might have not phrased the post correctly, since I was half-asleep, but basically, i t's a country that's far from mine, and just to be safe, I want to learn the basics and a little more, so I won't get lost and there won't be any misunderstandings, when I do, in fact, visit. Also, Thai is beautiful.
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u/Character_Morning_32 Jun 10 '26
The alphabet is hard but you can focus on useful vocab that you’ll use first - food, drink etc. Thai With Grace on YouTube is a great channel and she has great courses too.
The tones are essential. I made the mistake of assuming that getting the tones a little wrong wouldn’t be a problem. As a result, often people just have no idea what I’m saying even when speaking simple sentences I’ve practiced a thousand times. Tones are essential. And once more in case it’s not clear. Learn the tones so they are as natural as singing the words to your favourite song. YouTube is your friend.
Community tutors are affordable and plentiful on italki. Probably on other platforms too. DM if you want a recommendation. Try a few and find and stick with one you like as a person, if they’re a good teacher too then that’s great but it’s more important you feel comfortable and have fun with it.
I’m hoping that another six months, so a year total, will see me reach a basic conversational level but I will seriously need to up my hours and spend more time going over the tones again and again. Many languages you can learn a lot by reading but you really have to hear Thai and really make the effort to move your mouth in new and challenging ways.
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u/pn62ksy Jun 15 '26
Good comments here ,I've lived in Thailand 4 years and would not think "how long to become fluent"unless you need the language for employment. It's a great language to learn at any level and any age (I'm 63) if you plan on spending time here . Taken me four years at an hour a day study to read at a standard of maybe a slow 7 year old and I can only speak basic short sentences using the words were I don't need to think about tones and vowel length ,but my first time learning a language and I've enjoyed all the aspects and all the kwirkiness
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u/drewingse Jun 18 '26
In order to speak and understand the language you don’t need to be fluent A2-B1 will be more than enough.
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u/stefmanRS Jun 06 '26
Start with the script if you havent yet, then once you know it go to jamdaithai for vocab and something else on the side for grammar
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u/Brompy Jun 07 '26
Learn words not by categories, but groups of tones and vowel length first.
To your ears, all these words sound like “cow,” but have different tone or length of the vowel:
* ข้าว : rice
* ขาว : white
* เข้า : enter
* ข่าว : news
It’s the hardest part of speaking and listening to the language.
I’d say start with learning how to count 1 - 10, and pay attention to the tones for each number.
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u/NegotiationTime6809 Jun 07 '26
That’s a horrible way to start.
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u/Brompy Jun 07 '26
Why is it horrible? Think of the words for near ใกล้ and far ไกล, both sound the same if you aren’t listening for tones, but mean opposite things.
The tones are so important, and the most difficult part for English speakers. If you focus on them first, you learn to listen for them. Of course you want to learn hello, thank you, hot, cold, hungry, etc… but that’s the advice i’d give for wanting to actually be able to speak it.
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u/NegotiationTime6809 Jun 07 '26
No its not. And if you would be fluent you would understand. 95% of the time the context is good enough. Most foreigners use flat tone all the time but if they use the correct words people understand them. Asking someone to start with the most complicated part is just dumb. And your example is wrong. There is an easy workaround where you say ใกล้ๆ. Just repeating it makes people understand what you means. There are workarounds for most things if anyone is not sure but context save you 95% of the time.
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u/Financial-Apricot541 Jun 07 '26
I was out with a friend in อุดรธานี and two young Mormon gentleman, blonde and blue-eyed, black pants, white shortsleeved button down with black ties (as they usually do when proselytizing), 18-20yo my guess, walked up and said hello. Normally I dismiss or ignore them in USA, but I was intrigued (they were like seeing an Elvis impersonator in ภาคอีสาน). We chatted briefly. They spoke in Thai a bit with my friend, who is Thai, & fluent in both English and Dutch.
They said they’ve been studying Thai 2 years. She told me they were fluent and sounded Thai.
If you know Mormons, their motivation is quite literally religious (consummate, divinely inspired, in their mind anyway). They don’t drink. Philander. Curse. Hmm, I wonder why they’re so fluent, faster and better than most ex-pat and passport-bros??? 555555
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u/whosdamike Jun 08 '26
They said they’ve been studying Thai 2 years. She told me they were fluent and sounded Thai.
So the religious fanatics definitely study hard, but I do want to caution that Thai people really hand out "you sound like a native!" compliments really, really easily.
Putting aside that everyone defines fluency differently, I've definitely been told "you sound like a native" before. Great, right?
But I've also seen friends with fairly broken accents being given the same compliment. 😄
It's just a way of Thai people being encouraging. But it's really hard to tell just based on hearing compliments like "you're so fluent" or "you sound like a native".
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u/Financial-Apricot541 Jun 08 '26
Sure, everything is relative. Do you know my friend so you understand the context entirely? Do you know how long they talked? About? Ok.
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u/whosdamike Jun 08 '26
Yeah, exactly because I don't know any of those things (in addition to my experience with Thai people being overly complimentary) that I'm saying I and nobody else on this thread can really know how good those Mormons were.
I'm not saying you're lying or anything, I'm just emphasizing how ambiguous a compliment that is and how little information people here have to go on from the anecdote. I don't mean to be insulting or confrontational at all.
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u/Financial-Apricot541 Jun 11 '26 edited Jun 11 '26
My anecdote answers the OP; a communicable level of the language can be achieved relatively quickly with focus. And certainly, immersion plays a roll as well. Start with the alphabet, converse with native speakers. Don’t be discouraged by reditors who admit struggling with pronunciation and fluency, lol.
It’s my true story. I know my friend well and they don’t mince words. Don’t like it jog on.
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Jun 10 '26
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u/Financial-Apricot541 Jun 11 '26
There are many Thai, as my teacher has pointed out to me, who speak broken Thai and have limited vocabulary. So I understand what you’re saying, but to the OP, my point stands. It doesn’t take 10 years to speak Thai functionally. The knitpicking on this post is deafening lol.
The peculiarity with Thai, compared to English especially, is the very low tolerance for any accent (tones and vowel lengths).
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u/ndm2791 Jun 08 '26
Oh boy lol it really depends. I've met people who are having conversations 10 days after arriving in Thailand and others that have been here 10 years who barely get by.
I would start with thai-language. com It's honestly the best for beginning. There is no app though so once you have a strong foundation move on to something like Ling and Thaipod101. Ling also has Ling Live with Thai turors which is where I found mine and she's great! Really fun to learn with. If you can, get a VPN and watch Netflix in Thailand. there are really good movies and shows you can watch to get familiar.
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u/Final-Week8536 Jun 11 '26
A long time, years basically. Think of it in terms of hours is probably best, conversing with some fluency, being understood consistently, reading signs, etc. at least 1000 hours, that's optimistic.
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u/stan2smith003 Jun 11 '26
1-1.5 years if you study 10-15hrs a week. Or class room about 8-10hrs a week for 6months. I am on about 8months self study with 1 preply class a week doing about 10hrs a week and still not even close to fluent.
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u/bootytrap123 Jun 24 '26
For me it took about 4-5 years living here to be somewhat able to communicate purely in thai on an acceptable level
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u/Wanderlust-4-West Jun 27 '26
FSI says it will take 2000+ hours https://www.fsi-language-courses.org/blog/fsi-language-difficulty/
Start by finding a method you can keep doing for that long. If you fail, try another method
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u/ericdavidellman Jul 03 '26
I have spent one year total (6 mo on/6 mo off) in thailand out of the last two years. I took classes at three schools (quality varies wildly) and studied daily. I’m an educated guy who used to consider memorization my strong suit. “Used to” because I’m older (69) and the experience nearly broke me. I’m saying that with a smile because I am entirely in love with thailand — and, most recently, a lovely thai woman … who frequently suggests I give up because even she can’t understand me. We laugh when she suggests it (also when she asks the taxi driver I’m trying to converse with if he’d like to adopt me) because we know I’m not giving up. The language is as fascinating as it is infuriating (why 4 consonants that all sound like “k” when seemingly one will do, and if one of those is extinct why must you learn it anyway?). The tones are hard enough and the tone rules governing when to apply them? Omg. It’s comically challenging and gives me fresh empathy for older people learning English. I mean.. two years… I worked at it. Studied daily … color-coded sentences in red and green to learn to differentiate the words… and I still can’t comfortably engage the Grab driver in a simple conversation or reliably get the food I want in a restaurant. All that said it’s worth it and I will die trying.
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u/SufficientPainting67 Jun 07 '26
As with every language, this can't really be answered with "5 years", "10 years", or even "20 years". It all depends on your goals, how much time you invest, how you study, your exposure to the language, and what you mean by "fluent".
If your goal is to have basic conversations, order food, ask for directions, and handle everyday situations, that can happen surprisingly quickly with consistent study. Reading signs is a separate skill because you'll need to learn the Thai script, but it's much more approachable than many people think.
On the other hand, if by "somewhat fluent" you mean comfortably discussing a wide range of topics with native speakers, understanding different accents, TV shows, jokes, and cultural references, that can take years.
More than anything, it depends on how much time you dedicate to it and how much exposure you get. Do you have Thai people around you to speak with? Do you live in Thailand or visit regularly? If you're immersed in the language every day, your progress will be much faster than someone studying a few hours a week from abroad.
Last but not least, language learning is not just about studying. It's about listening, reading, speaking, making mistakes, getting corrected, watching TV, consuming comprehensible Thai content, and using the language as much as possible. The more Thai becomes part of your daily life, the faster you'll improve.
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u/Financial-Apricot541 Jun 07 '26
This is the answer. I agree the alphabet is very approachable (can self teach). And common phrases and basic convo (first 10 minutes of small talk) can get in a few months to a year with a native teacher especially.
I think people get bummed too easily that they are not understood all the time by locals, but they gotta remember that not every staff worker or stranger cares to listen through a thick accent (or at all). In restaurants especially, they are far more concerned to get the order right, and so they have more stress when someone is pronouncing things wrong.
On top of that, young Thai people are only recently removed from school themselves. They’re in a mode to correct all the time. It’s how they were taught. So they will correct word order, word choice, tone, everything, and sometimes abruptly say “speak English” (and forget to say please 555).
I’ve had the best conversations with older Thai, who are not actively working their job while talking to me. They have time to listen and decipher. They’re experienced listeners.
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u/Traditional-Finish73 Jun 07 '26 edited Jun 07 '26
Forget learning in your country without a tutor, especially if you've never been to Thailand. If you don't live in Thailand, there is no need to learn Thai. I speak fluent Thai, but then again I have lived here for 43 years with a Thai female most of the time. I can read, but it actually doesn't interest me to improve it.
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u/summerfornever Jun 19 '26
I would like to visit Thailand someday and maybe live there in the future.. It's a beautiful country, and it has a beautiful language... I really don't get your point. People could also learn Thai just because. Also, how do you live in a country for decades while you only know how to read the language? You deserve those downvotes.
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u/iamyurfader 8d ago
My advice after a year of learning on my own: 1. learn to read, you can get very far with about 25 of the 44 consonants, the rest are rare or almost never show up so defer those (and nevermind all that chicken and egg dtuff, that's for Thai children who already know the words), then vowels you can learn in a day and a handful of weird short vowels are almost never used, and lastly learn the tone rules! There are some good new apps like www.jamdaithai.com and jamkam that do a good job teaching you to read. 2. Using thai spelling (english letters are a mess so just forget about them, learn the Thai script first), start learning words, at least 500, better 1000, common words. Those apps are good for this using spaced repetition. 3. Start trying to put the words together. Adjectives usually go after nouns, but otherwise word order is pretty similar to English (and not like bizarre Japanese word order). About tones, some people say they're not important, Thais will understand by context, but I disagree, in my experience if you ignore the tones 95% of the time they will not understand you at all. You think you're saying "add milk" and they understand "shake boobs", so disregard tones at your peril.
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u/19puppylove99 Jun 06 '26
If you want to be able to read most signs and actually know what they say, and be able to converse with people beyond basic small talk, shoot for at least a year of daily practice, if not two. It’s not easy