What is Pimsleur Indonesian?
Pimsleur is one of the oldest names in language learning. Its method, developed by Dr Paul Pimsleur in the 1960s, is audio-only: a narrator introduces a short conversation, breaks it into pieces, and makes you say each piece out loud before asking you to recall it a little later, then later again. The Indonesian course follows the format exactly: thirty lessons of about 30 minutes, meant to be done one per day.
Unlike Spanish or French, which have five Pimsleur levels, Indonesian has just one. Malay is not offered. The modern Pimsleur app adds flashcards, a “speed round” game and reading lessons, but the audio lessons are the product.
What Pimsleur Indonesian does well
Speaking. After a week you can introduce yourself, ask for directions, order food and apologise, and you will sound surprisingly natural because you have only ever heard native speakers and have repeated everything aloud dozens of times. Indonesian pronunciation is not hard, but Pimsleur gets the rhythm and the polite forms (“permisi”, “maaf”, “Bapak/Ibu”) into your mouth early.
The interval recall works. Phrases from lesson 3 reappear in lesson 9 exactly when you were about to forget them. And because it is hands-free, it fits into parts of the day no other method reaches.
Where Pimsleur Indonesian falls short
Volume. Thirty lessons cover a few hundred words and a limited set of situations. When the course ends you can handle a hotel check-in but not a newspaper headline, a WhatsApp message or a menu with twenty dishes. There is no Level 2 to move on to.
Reading and Malay are the other gaps. Indonesian uses the Latin alphabet, so you should be reading from day one — Pimsleur barely does. And nothing in the course prepares you for Malaysia, Singapore or Brunei, where “kantor” is “pejabat”, “bisa” is “boleh” and dozens of common words differ. For the price, that is a lot missing.
How BahasaSystem.com compares
BahasaSystem.com is almost the mirror image: a large, free, text-and-audio vocabulary system rather than a small, paid, audio-only speaking course. Its 1,500 words are grouped by level and theme, every card carries the Malay equivalent with the difference flagged, and you can hear each word in an Indonesian or a Malay voice.
For input beyond single words there are 90+ dialogues and news articles with line-by-line audio and comprehension questions, and the Interval Study deck schedules reviews with FSRS — the same idea as Pimsleur’s interval recall, but applied to as many words as you like. There are no speaking drills; that is the one thing Pimsleur does that BahasaSystem.com does not.
The verdict: which should you choose?
Choose Pimsleur if your goal is to speak politely and confidently on a trip to Indonesia within a month and you are happy to pay for it. Choose BahasaSystem.com if you want to build real vocabulary, read, and learn Malay alongside Indonesian without paying.
The ideal combination for many learners is both: Pimsleur for the first month of speaking, BahasaSystem.com every day from the start for the words — and for everything after lesson 30.