Having completed the Duolingo Spanish tree a couple of times, I found that it gave me enough of the basics to work my way through books and follow some basic plot of TV shows with closed captioning.
It hasn't done a whole lot for my listening or speaking skills, but to be fair I often disable the listening and speaking exercises since I tend to do the exercises at work while I'm waiting for something to compile.
Duolingo will not make you fluent in a language, but it can give you the basics to build upon.
I like Duolingo and worked through a bit of their Spanish tree but one thing that I found baffling is how late they introduce numbers. I got to Spain knowing how to tell someone that my large uncle was a milk-drinking crab in the army, but without covering 1-10.
It hasn't done a whole lot for my listening or speaking skills, but to be fair I often disable the listening and speaking exercises since I tend to do the exercises at work while I'm waiting for something to compile.
Duolingo will not make you fluent in a language, but it can give you the basics to build upon.