This is the first app I tried, and after a few minutes, I was mortified….

The ‘Lite’ edition provides just a small dictionary of around 20 words, with the full-price version containing many dictionaries. However, even in the few words of the Lite version, there was a schoolboy error! Against Fa Caldo, the author had put the English Translation Cold !!  And of course, it’s not – it’s Warm !!

This is really a strange mistake, because any native Italian speaker – even anyone above beginner’s level, really – would never make such an error. Likewise, anyone with no knowledge of the language at all, creating it from a dictionary, would write the answers verbatim from the dictionary and still not make such an error! So it begs the question, who wrote the app?  The reviews do note some other errors, such as typos.

As for the app itself, it takes you through flash cards, and then a round of three different word-matching games, using 6-7 of the word pairs. It then does the same for the next 7 word-pairs, then the next 7. It is actually quite an effective method, but would get very boring, very quickly!

So – in short, boring, poorly-finished, and above all, flat wrong! I would definitely avoid this app, unless you wish to learn the ‘iPhone dialect’of Italian!

See a few snapshots, right – and see if you can match the words while you’re at it!