Practice Italian in Zurich with Native Speakers Online

Italian is one of Switzerland's four national languages, so it's not an oddity here the way it might be in a random German city — you'll hear it on the tram, in the banks along Bahnhofstrasse, among students at ETH and UZH. The people looking to practice usually fall into two camps: Ticinesi who moved to Zurich for finance or consulting jobs and want to keep the language alive, or Zurich residents learning Italian for family, for weekends at Lake Maggiore, or simply because in Switzerland speaking three languages isn't unusual.

Finding someone to practice with face to face is harder than it sounds. Zurich's workforce is spread across the city and the cantons around it — people commute in daily from Winterthur, Baden or Zug, and by the time they're off the S-Bahn at 6 or 7pm, an evening plan in Kreis 4 or Seefeld is the last thing on their mind. Language meetups do exist, at places like Volkshaus or the odd Stammtisch, but they tend to turn into big group nights where English takes over by the second round, and half of them get cancelled anyway once someone's meeting runs late.

Doing it over video means you don't need to be in the same Kreis, let alone the same canton. You get thirty minutes of real conversation in Italian and thirty in your own language, with someone who actually speaks it natively, whenever your evening — or your lunch break near Paradeplatz — actually allows it.