A new milestone as we bring language learning to all: Raising $78M Series C at a $1B valuation

Today, we’re marking the next chapter in Speak’s growth as we’ve raised $78 million in Series C funding at a $1 billion valuation. Our vision hasn’t changed since we started Speak eight years ago, and we remain laser focused on building the best way to get to spoken fluency with our AI tutor. We’ve come a long way in disrupting a historically offline and outdated way of learning, and we are only just beginning.

Accel led the round with support from existing investors including the OpenAI Startup Fund, Khosla Ventures, and Y Combinator among others. This marks our second preempted raise this year, with our valuation doubling in the six months since our last round. We’ve now raised $162 million to date. 

While language learning has evolved from traditional software to mobile apps, these solutions failed to solve the core challenge: being able to actually communicate out loud in the language. Our users consistently tell us the same story – despite years of studying English, they couldn't speak comfortably until discovering Speak. We've engineered a breakthrough in spoken fluency by combining our proprietary learning method with advanced AI that adapts to each user's needs, making true fluency accessible to so many more people. So far this year, users have already spoken more than one billion sentences with Speak. And in 2025, we plan to bring Speak to many, many more countries.

"Speak has emerged as a standout player in consumer AI, demonstrating exceptional growth and market potential," said Ben Quazzo, partner at Accel, who led the investment round and is joining Speak's Board of Directors. "With its strategic expansion into global and enterprise markets, coupled with effective, personalized language learning at scale and an experienced team, Speak is well-positioned to dominate this new category."

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What's next

We’re inspired about where our product experience is headed in the near future. The pace of improvement is continuing to accelerate as we get farther and farther along in building the world’s most effective language learning tutor. When you hire a human tutor, they get to know you, adjust teaching styles to best suit your needs, and personalize your learning. This year, we’ve created over 25 million personalized lessons for our users, adapting to their pace and style of learning. Over the next year, Speak will become a fully dynamic learning experience powered by our underlying learning engine, the latest LLMs, and major advancements in our speech technology. Much more coming here soon!

“Our 2022 investment in Speak was driven by a shared vision of revolutionizing language learning with AI,” said OpenAI Startup Fund partner Ian Hathaway. “We’re thrilled to see their world class AI talent and unique product vision create transformative learning experiences for a rapidly growing userbase worldwide. We’re excited to see Speak set new standards in AI learning.” 

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The need for a language tutor isn’t just personal, it’s also people’s business. Since our previous funding round, we introduced Speak for Business – our enterprise offering – bringing effective English learning to employers everywhere. From multinational operations to small businesses, English learning is industry agnostic. Our momentum is clear with more than 200+ customers across various industries, and an 85 percent adoption rate among employees. 

We are at an inflection point of a transformative shift in learning with AI. English isn't just a language; it's a key that unlocks life-changing opportunities from higher education and global careers to meaningful cross-cultural connections. We are energized by the opportunity to make personalized, AI-powered language tutoring accessible to millions of people worldwide. A huge thanks to our users, team, and investors who share our vision of getting people speaking confidently, one conversation at a time.

- Connor Zwick, Speak CEO & co-founder 

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