Most language apps teach you from their own material. A few let you collect words from what you read. Writing checkers catch your mistakes wherever you type, then forget them. MindDory collects the words you met wherever you met them, checks the sentences you write, and brings the words back on a schedule.
Positions are our reading of each app's public features as of September 2026, not a measurement. Filled dots bring what you saved back on a schedule, the half-filled one does it in some study modes, and hollow ones do not.
| App | Where the material comes from | Whose material it is | Brings what you saved back on a schedule |
|---|---|---|---|
| Duolingo | Its own course | The same lessons for every learner of a language | No |
| Babbel | Its own course | The same lessons for every learner of a language | No |
| Memrise | Its own courses with native-speaker video clips | Curated: you learn the words in its course, in its order | No |
| Quizlet | Study sets you type in or find in its library | Yours if you type the set, someone else's if you find it | Partly, depends on study mode |
| Anki | Cards you build by hand, or shared decks | Yours, if you type every card | Yes |
| Brainscape | Decks you build, or its published decks | Yours, if you type every card | Yes |
| LingQ | Articles and videos you import into its reader | Words you look up in what you chose to read | Yes |
| Readlang | Web pages you read with its browser extension | Words you look up while reading | Yes |
| Grammarly | Almost anywhere you type | Your own writing and its mistakes, built for correcting text rather than learning a language | No |
| MindDory | A photo of a book page, a word you select in Chrome, or your chats with Claude or another AI assistant | The words you met, plus a check of the sentences you write in Chrome | Yes |
By reading each app's public features in September 2026 and asking two questions: where does the material you study come from, and is it the same for everyone or is it yours? It is our judgement, not a measurement, and apps change. If a position looks out of date, write to support@minddory.com and we will fix it.
No, and it does not try to be. A course gives you structure and a path from zero. MindDory has no course. It is for the words your own reading, work and conversations keep handing you, and many learners use both: a course for structure, MindDory for the words life adds on top.
Those are readers: you read inside them, or with their browser extension, and save the words you look up. MindDory is not a reader. It collects words from wherever you already are: a printed book page you photograph, a word you select in Chrome, or a conversation with Claude or another AI assistant over the Model Context Protocol. Then it schedules them for review.
Because it sits closest to MindDory on one axis. A writing checker sees your own mistakes almost anywhere you type, which is exactly the material worth learning from. But it corrects the text and moves on; nothing comes back for review. MindDory keeps the words and brings them back: failed in an hour, hard in three days, known in a week.