Learn Georgian for Free from Italian at PBC Languages
Free Georgian practice for Italian speakers: native teachers, 1-to-1 exchanges, and the real traps (false friends, ejective sounds) explained.
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The alphabet is the first wall: Mkhedruli has 33 letters, no uppercase or lowercase, and none of them look like Latin script, so you're starting from zero visually even if the sounds behind some letters feel familiar. Once you're past that, Georgian is brutally phonetic - every letter is pronounced exactly one way, always, which is a relief coming from Italian where 'c' and 'g' change value depending on the vowel next to them. The real pronunciation fight is the three-way consonant contrast Italian doesn't have: plain, aspirated and ejective. Words like კარგი (k'argi, 'good') use a glottalized 'k' that doesn't exist in Italian at all, and consonant clusters like მწვანე (mtsvane, 'green') or the famous გვფრცქვნი (gvprckvni, 'you peel us') stack four or five consonants with no vowel to break them up.
Grammar is where Italian habits backfire. There's no gender and no articles, so 'il libro / la penna' distinctions disappear - genuinely easier. But 'avere' doesn't translate directly: 'I have a book' in Georgian is built around a dative-like construction, closer to 'to me there-is a book', and if you try to calque the Italian sentence word for word you'll build something a native won't parse. Verbs are polypersonal too: a single conjugated form like გნახავ (gnakhav) already means 'I see you', subject and object baked into one word, where Italian needs 'ti vedo' as two separate pieces.
What moves fast: the five vowels (a, e, i, o, u) map closely onto Italian vowels, so once you crack the alphabet, reading aloud stops being a guessing game almost immediately. Modern loanwords also give you a running start - პომიდორი (pomidori) is tomato, ბანკი (banki) is bank, თეატრი (teatri) is theatre - recognizable the moment you can sound out the letters.
Words you will actually hear
| Here | Elsewhere | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| mama (მამა) | mamma | False friend: in Georgian 'mama' means father, not mother. Confuses every Italian speaker in week one. |
| tu (თუ) | tu | Looks identical to the Italian pronoun 'tu' (you) but in Georgian it means 'if'. |
| sul (სულ) | sul | Same letters as the Italian contraction 'sul' (on the), but in Georgian it means 'always' or 'all the time'. |
| me (მე) | me | Georgian 'me' means 'I' (subject), while Italian 'me' is the object form - same spelling, opposite grammatical job. |
| pomidori (პომიდორი) | pomodoro | Genuine cognate for tomato - both borrowed from the same root, easy to recognize once you can read the alphabet. |
| banki (ბანკი) | banca | Modern loanword for bank, close enough to guess without a dictionary. |
| teatri (თეატრი) | teatro | Theatre - a European loanword that Georgian and Italian both took from the same source. |
| problema (პრობლემა) | problema | Nearly identical to the Italian word and used the same way in everyday speech. |
| universiteti (უნივერსიტეტი) | università | Long word but very guessable once sounded out letter by letter. |
| magazia (მაღაზია) | magazzino | Partial false friend: Georgian 'magazia' means shop or store, while Italian 'magazzino' means warehouse. |
How it works here
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Sign up and say your level
Two minutes. If you do not know your level, we place you in the first class.
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Pick a class or an exchange
Classes are led by a native teacher. An exchange is with another member: half the time in their language, half in yours.
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Join by video, nothing to install
From your phone or your computer. If you cannot make it, cancel and get your place back.
Questions about this
How long does it take an Italian speaker to hold a basic conversation in Georgian?
The alphabet alone takes most people a few weeks of regular practice before reading stops feeling like decoding. After that, progress depends entirely on how often you show up to classes and exchanges - Georgian's regular verb patterns help once you're past the script, but the polypersonal verb system takes longer to internalize than vocabulary does.
Is the one-to-one exchange actually free?
Yes. You trade half an hour of Georgian for half an hour of Italian with another member - no payment involved on either side. The only cost is your time and showing up prepared.
What level do I need before joining a group class or starting exchanges?
Group classes with native teachers are organized by level, so absolute beginners have a place to start, including learning Mkhedruli from scratch. For one-to-one exchanges, having even basic phrases helps, since your partner is a Georgian speaker learning Italian, not a teacher.
How exactly is the hour split in the exchange?
Thirty minutes in Georgian, thirty minutes in Italian, with the switch happening mid-session. Most pairs use a timer so neither language quietly eats into the other's half.
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