In Q4 2025, Duolingo announced it would let go of $50M in bookings to reach 100 million daily active users (DAUs) by 2028; a strategy Class Central covered in detail last month.  2026 is its “investment year,” and Q1 was the first quarter of execution. So far, the plan seems to be working. The Expected Results: Low Bookings, High DAUs Duolingo is running multiple tests to improve the free experience: spoken tokens for speaking practice, Speaking Adventures for real-world conversations, and fla

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Both Coursera and Udemy started 2025 with new CEOs. Greg Hart took over at Coursera in February. Hugo Sarrazin started at Udemy in March. Less than a month into the job, both CEOs were in conversations to sell their companies. On April 8, Hart and Sarrazin met for the first time at ASU+GSV. The rest, as they say, is history. In my 5,000-word analysis of Coursera’s acquisition of Udemy, I called the deal rushed. Two new CEOs, both less than a year into the job, merging two public companies. I w

Although Class Central lists online courses in 87 languages, courses made in English outnumber all of the others by more than six to one. English is therefore a useful language to know, even though some courses have subtitles in a range of languages. Earlier this year, we updated our list of courses to help improve your writing skills. These courses all assume some fluency in the language. But what if you do not know any English, or your English is very poor? If you do not have convenient acce

On April 9, shareholders of both Coursera and Udemy voted to approve the merger. The votes weren’t close. At Coursera, 99.4% of votes were in favor of issuing new shares to complete the acquisition. At Udemy, 99.9% voted to adopt the merger agreement. Out of more than 228 million shares that voted across both companies, fewer than 500,000 voted against. Coursera shareholders also approved doubling the company’s authorized shares from 300 million to 600 million, which is needed to issue the sto

In 2025, Udemy hit its first profitable year, but its Q4 2025 ended in a loss. A few days after announcing the numbers, the stock reached an all-time low. The company didn’t have an earnings call, nor did it release an investor presentation because of its pending merger with Coursera. The earnings call would have been helpful to break down the numbers, since the numbers look bleak from an investor’s perspective. The overall revenue has fallen for the first time since the company went public, a