Arabic Dialect Resources > Learn Levantine Arabic
Start with Live Lingua. Its Foreign Service Institute courses are free, cover Syrian, Jordanian and Levantine separately, and come with real audio and a downloadable book. Buy something only once you know which of the four countries you are learning for — that choice decides your course, and most courses will not say plainly which country they teach.
This page is about choosing. If you want to know what Levantine Arabic is, how many people speak it and how the qaf is pronounced, our Levantine Arabic page covers that and has 38 recordings you can play.
Pick a country first, then a course
Levantine is one dialect continuum across four countries, so whichever variety you learn will carry you through the others. But courses are written for one country, and buying the wrong one means months of vocabulary you will not hear where you are going. Pick the country you have a reason to pick: family, a job, a place you are moving to.
Each of the four has its own page with the full resource list and how the local speech differs.
- Syrian Arabic — the deepest pool of courses and drama, and the variety Pimsleur and the FSI courses teach.
- Lebanese Arabic — closest to Syrian, with the most music and the most YouTube teaching.
- Palestinian Arabic — the best served by academic textbooks.
- Jordanian Arabic — Amman is the region hub for Arabic study programmes and tutors.
- Jordanian Arabic region by region — how Amman, the north, the south, Aqaba and the Bedouin desert differ from each other.
Still undecided between Levantine and something else entirely? Which Arabic dialect to learn compares all thirteen.
Levantine courses and books compared
Every result on page one of Google for "learn Levantine Arabic" is a single course selling itself. None of them tells you which country speech it teaches, or whether it writes Arabic in Arabic letters. Both matter, and both are hard to find out before you have paid. Here they are side by side.
The script column is the one people regret. A course written entirely in transliteration will get you speaking faster and will leave you unable to read a text message.
| Resource | Which variety | Format | Arabic script? | Cost |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Live Lingua (FSI and DLI) | Syrian, Jordanian and Levantine as separate courses | Ebook plus audio | Yes | Free |
| Shou fi ma fi? | Lebanese and Syrian together | Book with audio samples | Yes | Paid |
| Colloquial Palestinian Arabic | Palestinian | Textbook | Yes, and it assumes you already read fusha | Paid |
| Hakini Arabi | Jordanian and Palestinian | Course | Yes | Paid |
| The 101 Most Used Verbs in Spoken Arabic | Jordanian and Palestinian | Verb reference with audio | Yes | Paid |
| Speaking Arabic: Conversational Eastern Arabic | Levantine broadly | Four books and five audio CDs | No, transliteration only | Expensive; look second hand |
| Colloquial Arabic (Levantine) | Lebanese | Course | No, all Arabic written in English letters | Paid |
| Conversational Arabic Quick and Easy | Lebanese | Phrasebook style | No, contains no Arabic letters | Paid |
| Pimsleur Eastern Arabic | Syrian | Audio only, spaced repetition | Not applicable, there is nothing to read | Paid |
| Mango Languages | Levantine, Syrian focus | App course | Yes | Paid |
| Spoken Arabic Dictionary (Diwan Baladna) | Jordanian | Dictionary | Yes, and you must read Arabic to use it at all | Paid |
| The Olive Tree Dictionary | Palestinian | Dictionary | No, transliterated | Paid |
| Living Arabic | Lebanese and Syrian | Online dictionary with apps | Yes | Free to use |
| Qasid Online | Jordanian | Structured course with one-to-one conversation | Yes | Paid |
| italki | Whichever your tutor speaks | One-to-one tutoring | Up to you and the tutor | Paid per hour |
How we chose, and what to skip
The test for this page was simple: can we say which country Arabic a resource actually teaches? Anything advertising itself as "Levantine" without naming a country got read more carefully, because that word covers four accents and a lot of vocabulary that does not travel.
Two we would not start with. Conversational Arabic Quick and Easy contains no Arabic letters at all, which makes it a phrasebook rather than a course; fine for a two-week trip, a dead end for anything longer. Speaking Arabic: A Course in Conversational Eastern Arabic is the most complete course here and we do recommend it, but it is expensive and also transliteration-only, so it works best alongside something that teaches you to read rather than instead of it.
The free option beats most of the paid ones for a beginner. The FSI and DLI courses on Live Lingua were built to get diplomats speaking, they include the audio, and they cost nothing.
Resources by dialect
The full lists below are what we recommend for each variety. Because the four overlap so heavily, it is worth reading all four whichever one you settle on; several resources, such as "Shou fi ma fi?" and the free Live Lingua courses, cover more than one country. For listening practice, our page of Arabic cartoons, TV shows and films marks which series are Levantine and which are fusha.
Jordanian Arabic
| Resource | Description |
|---|---|
| Hakini Arabi: Palestinian and Jordanian Colloquial | A course centered around the spoken Arabic in Jordan and Palestine. |
| The 101 Most Used Verbs in Spoken Arabic: Jordan & Palestine | An excellent book with detailed definitions and sample sentences. Includes audio. |
| My American Neighbor | A Comedy TV show in the Jordanian dialect. |
| Spoken Arabic Dictionary, Diwan Baladna | An excellent resource for speaking Jordanian Dialect. You must be able to read Arabic to use this book |
| CGE Jordan Institute | A Youtube channel that teaches Arabic so you can get around in Jordan. Mainly focuses on spoken Arabic. |
| Live Lingua Jordanian | Excellent course that teaches Jordanian dialect |
| italki Arabic | Connect with Arabic tutors and practice your conversational skills. |
| Talk In Arabic | A service that teaches you how to speak in Arabic dialects. |
| Qasid Online | An online course centered around teaching Jordanian Arabic. The course consists of a structured plan with one on one conversations. |
| Roya TV | TV news channel in Jordanian dialect. Be sure to check out their comedy and drama channels on youtube. |
| Jordanian Sesame Street | Sesame street in the Jordanian dialect. |
| Female Show | A popular Comedy series in the Jordanian dialect. It is a little challenging for beginners but worth watching. |
Lebanese Arabic
| Resource | Description |
|---|---|
| Lebanese Arabic Phrasebook | A Lebanese Arabic phrasebook with fun games and exercises to solidify your understanding of the dialect. |
| Conversational Arabic Quick and Easy | A great book for conversations in the Lebanese dialect. This book does not contain Arabic letters though. |
| Shou fi ma fi? | A book explaining the Lebanese and Syrian dialect with audio samples. |
Learn Lebanese Arabic with Hiba Najem | Youtube channel teaching spoken Lebanese Arabic. |
| italki Arabic | Connect with Arabic tutors and practice your conversational skills. |
| Talk In Arabic | A service that teaches you how to speak in Arabic dialects. |
| Living Arabic | Online dictionary for Lebanese Arabic. Offers mobile apps. |
| Colloquial Arabic (Levantine) | A course for Lebanese Arabic. All Arabic words are written in English. |
Palestinian Arabic
| Resources | Description |
|---|---|
| The 101 Most Used Verbs in Spoken Arabic: Jordan & Palestine | An excellent book with detailed definitions and sample sentences. Includes audio. |
| Colloquial Palestinian Arabic | Excellent book to learn Palestinian Arabic. The book assumes you have a firm understanding of Fusha. |
| Hakini Arabi: Palestinian and Jordanian Colloquial | A course centered around the spoken Arabic in Jordan and Palestine. |
| Live Lingua Levantine | Based on Palestinians living in Lebanon. Courses from Defense Institute and Foreign Service Institute that include an eBook and accompanying audio. |
| Learn Arabic with Maha | A youtube channel that teaches Palestinian Arabic |
| italki Arabic | Connect with Arabic tutors and practice your conversational skills. |
| Speaking Arabic: A Course in Conversational Eastern Arabic | A full, complete course designed for self studying the language. You learn over 2500 vocabulary words. It is quite pricey but comes with 4 books and 5 audio CDs. We highly recommend this course. Definitely check second hand resources to find it significantly cheaper. The only downside is that the book uses transliterations rather than Arabic script. |
| Talk In Arabic | A service that teaches you how to speak in Arabic dialects |
| Palestinian History | Website contains oral history of Palestinians. You can find many videos in the Palestinian dialect. |
| The Olive Tree Dictionary: A Transliterated Dictionary | An excellent dictionary to help you learn Palestinian Arabic. |
Syrian Arabic
| Resource | Description |
|---|---|
| Shou fi ma fi? | A book explaining the Lebanese and Syrian dialect with audio samples. |
| Syrian Mango Languages | Course that focuses on conversations in Syrian Dialect. |
| Live Lingua Syrian | Based on Syrian dialect. Courses from Defense Institute and Foreign Service Institute that include an eBook and accompanying audio. |
| Pimsleur Eastern Arabic | Conversational practice with spaced repetition technique of listening and repeating audio. Based on Syrian Arabic. |
| italki Arabic | Connect with Arabic tutors and practice your conversational skills. |
| Talk In Arabic | A service that teaches you how to speak in Arabic dialects. |
| Living Arabic | Online dictionary for Syrian Arabic. Offers mobile apps. |
| Playaling | A free service that allows you to view videos of people speaking Arabic. You can filter by difficulty. |
| SyrianArabic.com | A website dedicated to teaching Syrian Arabic |
| A Dictionary of Syrian Arabic | Excellent dictionary to help you learn Syrian Arabic |
Frequently asked questions
Which Levantine dialect should I pick?
Pick the variety spoken by the people you will actually talk to; family ties, a job posting, or a heritage connection beats any other criterion. If nothing points you to one country, Syrian and Lebanese offer the deepest pools of media to learn from, while Jordanian benefits from Amman being a hub for Arabic study programs and tutors. The differences are small enough that whichever variety you learn transfers to the other three with little effort.
Can Levantine speakers understand Egyptian Arabic?
Yes. Decades of Egyptian films and music made Egyptian Arabic familiar across the whole Arab world, so Levantine speakers follow it with ease. The reverse also works well: Syrian drama and Lebanese pop have given Levantine a similar reach, and Egyptians generally understand it without trouble. Egyptian and Levantine are the two most widely understood dialect families, which is a large part of why most learners choose one of them.
Is Levantine Arabic close to MSA?
Closer than the Maghrebi dialects of North Africa, but still a real step away. Levantine shares most of its core vocabulary with Modern Standard Arabic, which is why it is often recommended to learners who already have MSA. The grammar is simpler, though: case endings are gone, the present tense takes a b- prefix, and urban speakers pronounce the classical qaf as a glottal stop. MSA alone will not carry a street conversation in Beirut or Amman, but an MSA foundation makes Levantine much faster to pick up.
How different are Syrian, Lebanese, Palestinian, and Jordanian Arabic?
They form one dialect continuum, usually split into a northern branch (Syrian and Lebanese) and a southern branch (Jordanian and Palestinian). The differences show up in accent and intonation, a handful of everyday words, and how the qaf is pronounced; many Jordanian men use a hard g where a Beirut speaker uses a glottal stop, for example. Speakers from all four countries converse freely with each other, and learners can mix resources from any of them without confusion.