We started HelloTalk to connect people through language, culture, and community. At the core of this are Chats, a way to practice languages with native speakers through messages, calls, stickers, and more. Those in the know will surely recognize the image below.
Over time, we’ve developed several tools to help people who speak different languages come together and learn from each other on HelloTalk. In this article, we’ll give you a rundown of HelloTalk’s chat tools and how they can help you have better language exchanges.
How do I find chat tools in HelloTalk?
Chat tools are helpful aids designed to make communication easier. To find the chat tools, open a chat and hold down on any message (text, voice, video, image) to display the chat tools.
Now let’s explore how these tools can help you learn more efficiently, have better conversations, and make genuine connections with others in the HelloTalk community.
1. Translate
Translate any text to your native language at the tap of a button. Having a built-in translation function allows you to focus on the conversation instead of switching in and out of the app to understand what your language partner is saying to you.
Pro Tips
- You can customize the language you want to translate to by holding down on the translation
- You can set the default translation in the settings located on the profile tab
2. Correction
Corrections let the community help you learn better by correcting mistakes, suggesting more natural expressions, and explaining specific grammar rules. Corrections let you edit what the other person wrote and add notes and helpful pointers.
Pro tip
- Request and offer corrections for better language exchanges, so you and your language partner have notes to review later and can learn from one another
- You can save corrections as favorites and tag them for easy reference
3. Speak
Not all languages are phonetic or read like they are spelled. The speak function takes out that complexity, so you know exactly how to pronounce a word. This is a great way to practice speaking aloud until you feel confident enough to send voice messages, jump on a call, or join language events in Voicerooms and HelloTalk Lives.
4. Transliteration
This function is specific to character-based languages that do not use the Latin alphabet. Korean, Japanese, and Chinese have distinct alphabets and characters that make it difficult to read for non-native speakers. Transliteration spells out how to pronounce these words to help with understanding and also helps you efficiently learn to read and recognize new writing systems. Here is an example of the Pinyin transliteration for a sentence from my friend in China.
5. AI Grammar
AI Grammar is a tool for checking and correcting grammar, think spelling, syntax, verb tenses, and those lovely technical parts that form the rules of a language. AI Grammar helps you navigate these rules using artificial intelligence and studies huge datasets of text in different languages to analyze individual words and sentences and ensure they are free of any grammatical errors. If you know the content of what you want to say but aren’t quite sure about how to express it, then AI Grammar is a helpful tool to have in your corner.
6. Reply
Reply lets you respond directly to a specific text, voice message, image, or video in a chat. While this isn’t specific to language learning, it can help organize your chats and provide context to other chat members about which message you are replying to, especially when a group chat starts lighting up. Note, you can still use language specific tools: translate, correct, speak, transliteration, and AI grammar or replied messages.
7. Copy
The copy function is pretty self-explanatory. The copy tool is especially useful when combined with a memorization or flashcard tool, so you can practice new words later on. It also lets you copy and paste new words to get another opinion or explanation from one of your other language partners.
8. Favorite
This tool is not known by many HelloTalkers and is a quick way to consolidate helpful learning points or meaningful chats you share with other community members. You can access and search for your Favorites in the main Chat tab or under your profile.
Some of the best features include adding tags to each saved item. You can also search your favorites by keyword or filter by tag or type (text, Voice, Moments, corrections, etc.) to quickly find what you’re looking for. The favorite tool is a must-have for serious language learners or someone who wants to organize all their social activities on HelloTalk.
9. ✨ Recall – introducing the power of second chances
As of today, you can now recall messages in chats. Armed with the power of second chances, you can now recall, rewrite, and resend messages to your language partners. For example, someone may make a mistake shortly after sending a message or accidentally send a link to the wrong chat, recall lets you correct any of these without anyone seeing them.
Practice your way with HelloTalk
HelloTalk’s built-in chat tools revolutionize language learning, empowering learners to practice with native speakers in an immersive and supportive environment. In addition to chats, interactive Voicerooms, HelloTalk Lives, LiveClasses, and Moments (public posts that are shared with the entire learning community) let you practice languages the way you learn best. Download the HelloTalk app for free today to take advantage of these chat tools while broadening your horizons through language and culture exchange.
