5 min freeYour first shift
Marina Kovács
Your partner's mother, meeting you for the first time
Runs rooms pitched at confident fluency and advanced fluency
American EnglishEither way. You pick before you start, from Cleveland, OHRemembers your past conversations
5.0(3)
From 10 min
A session of any length
First 5 minutes free
In Marina’s words
Marina has made lunch and she is delighted you came.
She is also going to ask what your parents do, how you met, and what you are planning, in that order, in the first ten minutes, the way somebody does when they have decided to like you and are looking for permission. This is the highest-stakes warm conversation there is. Nobody is being difficult, nothing is a test, and getting it wrong costs you something no exam can. The specific difficulty in a second language is that warmth needs a register you have never been taught: not formal, not slang, and able to make a joke land with somebody thirty years older than you.
1min
They speak first, about a second after you press start. There is no press-to-talk and no waiting for your turn.
4min
Four minutes of the real thing, at the real pace, with the interruptions where a real one would put them.
1min
Your pace, your pauses and your filler words are counted within a second, and the score follows. Nobody asks for a card to hear it.
What a score from Marina is worth
How the score is worked out here
Three things, and you can read what each one actually means. None of them turn this into an exam: talk to this person as often as you like, and the score is there only if you want it.
Run on Marina
Cleared
Published criteria
The criteria and their weights are visible before you speak.
- Here
- Parents, work, plans, the order is consistent across cultures, and every one of them has a wrong answer that is only wrong because of how it was said.
- Held by
- Published in advance; changes go through review
- Method
- Before you speak you can see what is being measured and how much each thing is worth, as percentages that add up to a hundred. That is checked automatically: a set whose percentages do not add up never reaches the site.
Situations and levels
What Marina runs, and what a fortnight of it costs
A minute costs the same whoever you talk to: the expensive part is the model, not the person. Move the sliders to match the two weeks you actually have.
Situations
Difficulty
What it costs to rehearse this properly
Three runs across a week is what changes an answer. Move the sliders to your own plan. Nothing renews, and nothing is charged until you buy minutes.
- Minutes of talking in total
- 60
- The same conversations with a native speaker
- $300
- You save
- $274
- You pay
- $26
Ratings
What 3 people made of Marina
Every one of them finished a conversation with Marina before they could leave a rating. One conversation, one rating — the rule is in the database, not in a form. That is why the number under the stars means something.
5.0
3 ratings
- 53
- 40
- 30
- 20
- 10
Every one left after a session with Marina
Marina was warm, but the questions about family and future plans came fast. Good practice for answering personal things without sounding rehearsed.
After a session with Marina
1 person has talked to Marina, rated it and written about it. Ratings left through the product will join these, and only a finished conversation can leave one.
Compared with a live native speaker
11 conversations with Marina for the price of one with a native speaker
Talking with a live native speaker is the best practice there is, and it is priced like it: from $50 a conversation, at a time that suits them. Here a conversation costs $4.40, starts when you press the button, and can be had again tomorrow.
A conversation with a native speaker
$50
A conversation here
$4.40
Nothing to book, and the same conversation can be had as many times as you like.
| A live native speaker | Reallang | |
|---|---|---|
| What one conversation costs | From $50 | $4.40 |
| When you can talk | When they have a slot | Now, or at six in the morning |
| Who is across the table | The same person every time | A recruiter, a doctor, a neighbour: 56 people |
| Will they interrupt you | Rarely. You are the one paying | Yes, like in real life |
| Feedback in writing | Usually none | 60 seconds later, quoting you |
| A real person across the table | Yes | No, an AI person |
The last row is the honest one: a real person is a real person, and nothing replaces that. But getting comfortable speaking takes dozens of conversations, not one a week at $50. Your teacher teaches you the language; this is the practice in between.
Start a session
Pick the meeting, and Marina starts talking
There is no calendar, because there is nothing to wait for. Choose which conversation it is, allow the microphone, and a second later you are talking.
Which conversation are you having?
Marina Kovács runs 2 meetings. They are different conversations, not easy and hard versions of one, and each has its own criteria.
What counts as going well
Be warm without being formal, answer the third question honestly, and get one light moment to land.
Tell Marina Kovács one or two things about your situation and the conversation will be about it.
0/280
Marina Kovács
American English · neutral
Remembers your past calls
How they speak
- The score
- 60 seconds after
- This session
- $4.40
- After that
- $4.40
- The first 5 minutes cost nothing and no card is asked for.
- We ask for your microphone before the conversation starts, never after.
- Audio is not stored. The written record of the conversation is, because the score quotes from it.
Also free the first time
Who to talk to after Marina
Ranked against Marina on whichever line you are choosing by. Save two or three and read them side by side.
- 5 min freeYour first shift
5 min freeBehind the counter
5 min freeNeighbours
5 min freeNeighbours