Free Language Media Resources
I found some places where you can find content in the language you're learning. Most of these places have multiple languages, I'll note if some are better for certain ones.
Youtube: obviously. Look up "comprehensible input" plus the language you're learning, or "podcast" or "learner podcast" plus the language you're learning, or look up shows like "Chinese Drama" or simply the name of the show in the language such as if you want to watch cdrama Ultimate Note type in "终极笔记" or if you want to watch Goodbye My Princess then search by the Chinese title which is "Dong Gong" (and yes you can search by pinyin sometimes with English Keyboard, if you don't have a Chinese Keyboard and can't type hanzi). You can find Japanese let's plays by simply searching the title of the game in Japanese plus "実況" or "実況プレイ" or in all kana "じっきょうプレイ," so for example for a Kingdom Hearts Japanese Lets Play you'd type or paste into Youtube's search bar "キングダムハーツ実況." You can find target-language/language-you-know translations with audio in 100-1000-5000 sentence clusters, you just look up language plus "1000 common words in sentences" (type in the language you want the translations so type that in Spanish if you want Spanish translations) along with the language you're learning in the language you just type'd translation (so type "Korean" if you searched in English words, type "coreano" if you searched in Spanish words). Those videos are basically free Glossika equivalents. You can find so much on Youtube, you could probably learn a language just from Youtube stuff if you had to. I recommend the app NewPipe as it's easy to install on your phone, has no ads, and you can turn off Youtube's new AI dub feature. Or use Youtube ReVanced app, where ads are also blocked, and you can turn off the AI dub feature if you follow a fix-ai-dub tutorial like I did. Or on Regular Youtube app, you should be able to click Settings on a video you're watching, then click 'audio track' and change to 'original audio' to get the AI dub turned off. But I'll be honest I haven't used regular Youtube app in years.
Tubi: FREE app, website, on TVs and phones and game consoles so you can watch on your TV if you want. Has ads, but I find their timing and duration less annoying than actual cable now or regular youtube ads. Has some foreign language stuff! I found cdramas like Oh My General, Story of Yanxi Palace, My Heroic Husband, Under The Skin, Three Body, some jdrama BLs like Candy Color Paradox, Mr Unlucky Has No Choice But to Kiss, My Personal Weatherman, and some kdramas I know I loved like The Guest, Psychopath Diary, The Crowned Clown. There's also some Spanish, French, German, and Russian shows and movies I found. As I live in the US, a LOT of Spanish stuff is on there (and is true for Netflix as well - Spanish dubs of English language shows are probably the easiest to find on streaming platforms in the US). Tubi in particular had a sizeable amount of Chinese, Korean, and Japanese shows, along with very large amounts of Spanish shows/movies, and at least some stuff in other languages. I have been using Tubi for it's live TV feature, where it has several Spanish language channels so I can just turn on Spanish TV channels without having to think about what to watch.
Pluto: another FREE app, website, on TVs and phones and game consoles so you can watch on anything you want! Has ads, but I find their timing and duration less annoying than actual cable now or regular youtube ads. Less international offerings than Tubi, but it has some. As I'm in the US, same sizeable amount of Spanish content, especially TV channels on it's live TV feature (they have Comedy Central Espanol so all those shows in Spanish, Naruto and The Walking Dead en Espanol, UK MISFITS EN ESPANOL which I just found today I LOVE that show, and several reality/documentary TV channels which I find are good practice as usually what's being talked about also has visuals directly related - like the survive in Alaska shows, the romance shows, the true crime shows). I think Pluto has Slightly Better Spanish live TV channel variety. As for other language stuff though... if you search in Pluto, search by language like "espanol" "francais" "zhongwen" and "spanish" "french" "mandarin" "cantonese" to find shows/movies. The search seems to show varying results depending on which term you use, but I am finding some media for all of those languages... and also English content involving those countries. So searching is a challenge at times.
AntennaPod: an app on Androids (I am not sure if it's on ios) for saving Podcasts in one place (if you don't have Spotify or Apple Podcast, and I don't have those). Benefits - it's free, you can stream or download episodes, you can search online for ALL the podcasts you listen to on various platforms and save them all in THIS app. I think you can fast forward past ads too, but I haven't tried. The app doesn't inherently seem to have ads, just plays whatever ads the podcast had put in themselves. I did have my English, Spanish, French, and Mandarin podcasts all open in a ton of tabs on my phone web browser and bookmarked in youtube. Now I have them ALL saved in AntennaPod in one place, and can close some tabs! I still save stuff in youtube though, when I want the podcast videos to help visually understand stuff (like for some Spanish and Mandarin podcasts). I think AntennaPod is free open source software. It's been great since I found it.
Hoopla: if you belong to a library, check if your library has Hoopla app membership included. Mine does. Hoopla has SO MANY books, audiobooks, shows, movies, music, in tons of languages. A LOT of the first Mandarin audiobooks I listened to, I found in Hoopla and just checked out for free. Also good for COMICS, in any language, and I read a lot of English comics and English translated manga in Hoopla. All free to check out, as it's an extension of your library membership basically.
Libby: same deal as Hoopla above - some libraries have a membership, you can check out free stuff in multiple languages if your particular library paid for access to that media in Libby. All free.
Bilibili.com: you should be able to search the site on a computer with Chinese Keyboard (type hanzi) logged out, and watch or listen to things. If you can figure it out, you can make an app account on your cell phone, I figured it out years ago but don't know how to log back in so I've been coasting on 'permanently logged in' for a while so I can bookmark stuff and so Bilibili app saves where I'm at in a given video so I can continue where I left off. But if you can't get the app to work, searching in Chinese ON your computer logged out WILL get you access to all the same videos I can access. A TON of free audiobooks, audio dramas, Mandarin dubbed cartoons and anime, Mandarin dubbed shows from all over the world, you search for it and you'll probably find it. Also lets plays, reaction channels, vloggers, fanvideos and fanedits of books and shows, you can find japanese shows IN japanese and Indian shows in their original language, you can find English and Korean shows in their original language free, you can find English audiobooks free. You basically just NEED to know how to search in Mandarin. If you can search using Mandarin search terms (here's my post on Basic Chinese Search Terms), you can find almost anything on Bilibili. Lately I've been enjoying the Mandarin dub old niche anime on there, and some japanese musicals. If you do make an account, Bilibili is great at recommending stuff like you've been watching, so my account is nearly ALL BL jdramas and cdramas, danmei audio dramas based on novels by authors I have been listening to, Mandarin dubbed anime, danmei audiobooks, and Mandarin dubbed jdramas and English mystery/crime solving/supernatural shows. It used to be all Disney cartoons and movies Mandarin dubbed a few hundred hours ago, when I was mostly relying on cartoons to learn more basic words.
Search in Mandarin (if you know it): Oh also? If you have never searched Google, Microsoft Edge, DuckDuckGo etc. in Mandarin, try if you know the words in Mandarin. So many FREE books, audiobooks, audio dramas, shows, movies, not just in Mandarin but in many languages, if you search with Mandarin search terms! 免费 mianfei is the word for "free" so you can search in all Mandarin translation "Skins BBC episode 1 English online free" and you'll find it! That's how I found the show to stream online free recently. Or search "daomubiji nanpaisanshu xiaoshuo zaixian mianfei" (in English it is: The Lost Tomb/DMBJ NPSS novel online free) and you'll FIND the novels for DMBJ. You want fanfiction instead? Search for that! The Mandarin internet still has a ton of free stuff that is now quite hard to find if you search in English. For finding any language content, if you know Mandarin try searching using Mandarin words. If you can search using Mandarin search terms (here's my post on Basic Chinese Search Terms), you can find nearly anything online free.
Khan Academy: free lessons in multiple languages, if you want to learn something while listening to your target language. I recommend searching in a search site like Google.com "khan academy espanol" or whatever language you're learning, in the word for the language that language uses, so you can find THAT language's version of the Khan Academy site.
Project Gutenberg: has a lot of free books online. I have not found much use for this site except finding old English books, but I know it has books in other languages.
Archive.org: the GOLDEN TIER of finding OLD language learning textbooks online free, just by searching "learn" or "grammar" or "nature method" or "Textbook" along with the language you're learning, and narrowing search terms. I found all of the old Nature Method textbooks I've used on Archive.org, and a lot of other cool stuff. Sometimes you have to only search the language like "spanish" or if trying to find say old Spanish history books, or French fiction books, you'll need to either know the title or leave that blank and use 'filter by' language and pick the language's books you're looking for. Also great for finding old media, I've found older anime I'd been meaning to find both IN only Japanese, and in English sub or dub.
