10 Things To Know Before Buying Rocket Chinese (Review)

I wanted to share my review of Rocket Chinese and the results I got from a year-long experiment testing it out.

It's a very popular Mandarin Chinese course (actually 3 individual courses), but it's hard to sift through the mountain of fake reviews and nonsense to find accurate info about whether or not the program actually works.

I should say: any opinion of Rocket Chinese is going to depend on personal goals and learning style (aka subjective).

What I mean by this is that Rocket Chinese is a structured, A to Z course, leading the student from zero knowledge to advanced lessons in Level 3.



Other people prefer guidance (which makes Rocket Chinese ideal for them).

As for the company, it's been around for ages.



  1. Does Rocket Chinese work? (i.e. does it produce results)
  2. If it does work, how far does it get you? (what level of Chinese fluency can you expect after it)



I like
  • Easily the most comprehensive Chinese course online
  • High quality, natural Chinese dialogues
  • Well-structured and designed
  • One-time payment option
  • Fully downloadable
  • Mobile app included
  • Uses Google voice recognition technology
  • Active and helpful community
I don't like
  • Structured format may feel too rigid for autodidacts
  • Spammy company reputation
  • No video component
  • Quizzes are poorly implemented
  • Uninspiring interface

1. Rocket Chinese is best suited for people who like structure




Some people thrive with self-guided learning.

Any honest review of Rocket Chinese should mention that it's designed for the opposite style of learner.


That means that a person who does better learning their own way may feel that Rocket Chinese is too rigid and linear for their tastes.


Yes, there's a but. 🙂

You aren't required to move in a linear progression with Rocket Chinese.




2. Rocket Chinese's reputation doesn't do it any justice

I've learned through numerous interactions that Rocket Chinese doesn't have the greatest reputation in the polyglot community.

Its name tends to be associated with spammy marketing.

This may have something to do with the company's early marketing days when its partners promoted Rocket heavily in what today would be regarded as unsolicited junk mail (not to mention all the fake Rocket Chinese reviews floating around).



3. Rocket Chinese uses the best speech recognition technology in the world (but it's not their own patented technology)


RS was way ahead of the game back then.


While researching for this review, I learned that Rocket Chinese utilizes the superior speech recognition developed by Google, and made available to the world through their API.


I don't think anything compares to it honestly.

So in Rocket Chinese, when you record your voice to check your pronunciation, the Rocket Chinese server basically sends the voice sample to Google which then computes whether or not it's accurate.

It returns a positive or negative response.

It's a brilliant implementation of a freely available technology that really works accurately to check your Chinese pronunciation for mistakes.

4. You can download Rocket Chinese and use it offline

As it stands, when you become a member of Rocket Chinese, you're given the option in every lesson to download the material to your computer.

Every lesson.


I can't emphasize how great this is.

In a world where everything is becoming dependent on online subscriptions that heavily restrict your access to stuff you've paid for, Rocket Chinese still lets you download and own their course.

Imagine owning what you paid for! 🙂


If you're in a language class, you can use the downloaded Rocket Chinese material in your lessons.

5. Lessons are delivered as short podcasts (but just use the dialogues)

Rocket Chinese podcast lessons are introduced and hosted by Alex (an English speaker) and Maria (an Chinese).

This "banter" style has become quite popular in recent years (see ChineseClass101 also).

I recommend just sticking to the dialogues, however.

Thankfully, Rocket Chinese gives you the option to just listen directly to the native Mandarin dialogue and skip the podcasts (I've mentioned the value of this in past reviews). It may be helpful to some people, but I'm not a fan of listening to podcasts.


Use them for repetitive listening practice.

6. A review of Rocket Chinese pricing (and their extended refund policy)

Most online language course subscriptions have a 30 day refund policy.

Rocket Chinese actually has a 60 day policy.

It's quite long when you think about it but it's great to know for basically two whole months, you can ascertain whether or not Rocket Chinese is a good fit.

Two months.


Here's the Rocket Chinese pricing:

Level 1: $149.95

Level 1 and 2: $299.90

Level 1,2 and 3: $449.85



Keep your eyes out for those price drops when they happen.




No ads or annoying distractions.



8. Don't cheap out on the travelogue - it's worth it

There's an additional "add-on" to Rocket Chinese called the "travelogue".

Take my advice: get it.

A lot of people who sign up for Rocket Chinese ignore it but it has almost 3000 additional Chinese phrases that are absolutely invaluable.

If you end up getting the full Rocket Chinese course or even just level 3 after reading this review, add the travelogue onto it for full value.

It's quite cheap compared to the rest of the course too.



In Rocket Chinese's case, there's a learner forum and a leaderboard.






10. All 3 levels of Rocket Chinese (+ Travelogue) offer the most comprehensive Mandarin Chinese course online

There just isn't any other Chinese course online of comparable depth and substance.

With all 3 levels and the travelogue, you have a quality Chinese resource that will last you many months or even years into your Chinese learning.

Regardless of your starting level.

I often say that you can achieve full fluency in Mandarin Chinese in just one year, and Rocket Chinese is more than sufficient as your primary course material.


For an alternative perspective or more info, see this review of Rocket Chinese.

Author: Yearlyglot

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