| You can… | Roughly | Study needed |
|---|---|---|
| Greet, thank, order food | 2–4 weeks | 15 min a day |
| Read Devanagari aloud | 4–8 weeks | 20 min a day |
| Hold a slow conversation | 4–6 months | 30 min a day + weekly speaking |
| Talk comfortably about your life | 1–2 years | daily contact with the language |
| Follow a film without subtitles | 2–3 years | sustained listening |
Speaking practice, more than anything else. Two learners studying the same number of hours will end up in very different places if one speaks weekly with a person and the other only uses an app. Comprehension grows either way; production only grows when you produce.
Twenty minutes daily beats three hours on Sunday. This is not motivational advice, it is how memory consolidation works.
Having a reason. Learners with a specific person to talk to, a trip booked, or a film they love tend to finish. Learners who want to "learn a language" mostly do not.
Halve everything above. Marathi, Gujarati, Bengali, Nepali and Punjabi speakers share script, vocabulary or grammar with Hindi and typically reach conversation in two or three months.
Reading an answer is one thing; being corrected while you say it is another. EkGuru tutors teach one to one from $6 a lesson, and most offer a trial.