Updated 6/8/2025 - List of Comprehensible Input Chinese Resources:
Comprehensible Input Wiki - this wiki includes tons of Comprehensible Input Lessons linked for many languages. I go back to this regularly. Go to the Chinese sections for Chinese.
Vidioma.com - a person made this site to make it easy and convienient for people learning Chinese to find CI Lessons for their level of understanding. I think they were trying to make something similar to Dreaming Spanish's site to help encourage learners to start/continue by making it easy and in one place. Time watched is tracked on the local device you're using it on, there's no account sign up, and the website makes no money - it links youtube videos of youtubers that teach Chinese.
r/ALGMandarin Wiki - includes playlists made by learners of the content, sorted for beginners.
r/ALGhub Aural Resources List - includes comprehensible input lessons and learner podcasts for many languages, go to Chinese - Mandarin section.
Lazychinese.com - Su Qing made this website, her youtube channel is Lazy Chinese. Like Dreaming Spanish, it is Comprehensible Input Lessons on a website where paying a subscription will unlock more lessons. This website is still growing, the payment goes directly to Lazy Chinese and the teachers making the lessons. (As it is still growing, I recommend also checking out each teacher's youtube channels too, for example I love Xiaogua Chinese channel).
r/ALGhub What Is Automatic Language Growth? - page that explains ALG if you want to to it. (My quick summary is ALG is using only comprehensible input lessons that contain ONLY the target language, until you can use materials for native speakers, avoiding thinking about the language such as anaylzing/translating in your head/using translations and explanations, and waiting to speak and read until you feel you have a good grasp of listening skills. So 600-2000 hours depending on the language, ALG Thai courses typically recommend waiting 1000-2000 hours, Dreaming Spanish typically recommends waiting 600-1000 hours. Note: ALG is stricter than Krashen's input hypothesis that "we acquire language by having meaningful experiences we understand in the language" and therefore CI is not a synonym for ALG. ALG is comprehensible input, but comprehensible input is a much BROADER category than ALG. ALG was invented by Marvin Brown, who felt it is ONLY comprehensible experiences in the language we acquire language from, and nothing else is necessary or beneficial. Brown felt the other activities were detrimental to success. Brown also felt speaking early, or any explicit study and analysis of ANY language would damage ultimate ability in languages. This is the controversial point - as many other teaching programs that include Comprehensible Input Lessons still feel there's a place for grammar study and translations and explanations. Most learning programs for learning a language, do not worry that explicit study will damage their ultimate result, and do not care when one begins to read or speak).
Dreaming Spanish Method - includes the roadmap I'm often referencing, Dreaming Spanish Method is the ALG method, just a bit more lax. Dreaming Spanish also says to avoid explanations and translations, but to look you at them if curious then it won't hurt. Dreaming Spanish says you should wait to read and speak 600-1000 hours, but if you need to do it earlier then do, or if you will give up unless you do them early then just do them. (This is basically why I prefer going to r/dreamingspanish, their more lax approach to the ALG method means I can find more learners who are using Comprehensible Input Lessons alongside other study activities or study history, which is more compatible with my own experiences).
*personal note: think ALG's ideas are a bit extreme. I do not think explicit study, translations, speaking early, or reading early will create an insurmountable block for most people's language goals. I am not doing pure ALG. If you feel like doing pure ALG though, it will work. There's plentiful examples on r/dreamingspanish of people doing pure ALG to successfully reach B2 level, and people doing additional things that contradict ALG and successfully reaching B2 level. Dreaming Spanish's method and roadmap are a slightly more lax approach to ALG if you'd like to try it out without completely following the ALG rules, and you can find many people to connect with who also did ALG somewhat but not purist in that learning community.
My recommendations are: no matter who you are, the linked resources above are ALL useful for Practicing Extensive Listening. You'll need to practice listening to improve your listening skills, and many of these resources will have easier options for beginners and intermediate learners to practice with. These linked resources also are great ways to learn words/grammar in visual context with no translations, and learning more is always useful. If you enjoy learning from context, you may find these resources suit how you like to learn. So I think anyone studying could find these useful.
