Speaking Everyday Irish
Build conversational confidence in Gaeilge from your first phrases to real-world interactions. Master everyday greetings, social exchanges, and café orders while unraveling the core mechanics of Irish sentence structure and pronunciation.
Like Duolingo, but for Speaking Everyday Irish. Tomo turns the whole topic into a game you play five minutes a day, until it actually sticks.
23 levels across 3 sections, about 46 minutes end to end, roughly 9 days at five minutes a day. It moves through First Exchanges, Navigating Daily Life, and The Mechanics of Irish. It starts from scratch.
Free forever · No credit card · iPhone & Android
Key ideas in Speaking Everyday Irish
- Traditional Irish greetings invoke blessings rather than clock time
- The first person says 'Dia dhuit' ('God with you'), and the responder adds Mary to top the blessing with 'Dia is Muire dhuit' ('God and Mary with you')
- Repeating 'Dia dhuit' back is unnatural in traditional Irish etiquette
- While regional dialects have distinct phrases for 'how are you' (like 'Cén chaoi a bhfuil tú?'), 'Conas atá tú?' is widely understood across all Irish dialects
- 'Tá mé' means 'I am'
- 'Tá mé go maith' means 'I am well', where 'go' turns 'maith' (good) into the adverbial phrase
- Irish expresses many everyday social conventions via idiomatic phrases rather than direct one-word equivalents
- 'Le do thoil' translates literally to 'with your will' rather than a compact word like 'please'
- 'Go raibh maith agat' literally expresses a wish: 'may there be good at you' ('may you have good')
- All common Irish farewells build around 'slán', which means 'safe' or 'healthy'
- The person leaving says 'Slán agat' ('safety at you') to the person remaining
- Irish commonly uses 'Is mise [name]' ('I am [name]') to introduce yourself
- The everyday verb 'tá' is not used to equate an identity with a name
- Literal translations of 'my name is' are unnatural compared to using the copula 'Is mise'
- Origin is expressed with 'tá... as' ('from')
- Current location or residence is expressed with 'tá... i' ('in')
You've tried the other tabs
Thirty open tabs. Four facts you actually kept.
You watched. You nodded. By Sunday it was gone.
One answer, then back to scrolling.
Eight weeks. You meant to finish. You didn't.
Tomo gives Speaking Everyday Irish the Duolingo treatment: levels, streaks, and quick quizzes that test what you just learned. That game loop is what the tabs above never had, so it's the one you actually finish.
Here's what playing it feels like
A real question from this course. Take your best guess.
Picture this: a neighbor says 'Dia dhuit' ('God with you'). How do you reply to top the blessing?
Get it right to open this lesson and 22 more in the app.
Where Speaking Everyday Irish takes you
- 1
First Exchanges
- Greetings and Partings
- Introducing Yourself and Others
- 2
Navigating Daily Life
- Ordering Food and Drink
- Expressing Feelings, Needs, and Ownership
- Finding Your Way Around
- 3
The Mechanics of Irish
- Word Order and Question Logic
- The Two Verbs for 'To Be'
- Sound Shifts: Lenition and Eclipsis
3 sections · 8 units · 23 levels. Built to play, not to enroll.
Tomo is in ChatGPT
Tomo is also a ChatGPT plugin: the same playable courses, built and played inside your chat.
Add Tomo to ChatGPT- What to ask
- “Make me a Tomo course on black holes.” “Turn this chat into a Tomo course.”
- What you get
- Quick questions with instant feedback, hearts and stars, ready to play in about a minute.
- Where it goes
- No sign-up to start. Connect your Tomo account and your streak carries on in the app.
You pick the voice
Speaking Everyday Irish is taught in the Storyteller style: every lesson is a story. Want a different feel? In the app you can spin up the same topic in any of Tomo's teaching styles. Same facts, totally different vibe.
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Start Speaking Everyday Irish today.
Download Tomo, search Speaking Everyday Irish, and play your first lesson in under a minute.