Which English Dictionary is Best for You We Reviewed 9 Popular Online Dictionaries
Hi, I’m Oli.
Welcome to Oxford Online English!
In this video, you’ll see reviews of several
online dictionaries.
Which dictionary is the best for English learners?
Which should – or shouldn’t – you use?
You’ll find out!
In this video, you’ll see the pros and cons
of nine popular online dictionaries.
We tested the following: Cambridge, Longman,
dictionary.com, Collins, Lexico, Macmillan,
wordreference.com, Chambers and Merriam-Webster.
If you want the short version here it is.
Are you an upper-intermediate or advanced
English learner who wants the most complete,
full-featured online dictionary?
Use Longman.
Are you at intermediate level or below?
Use Lexico.
Maybe use Lexico even if you’re at a higher
level.
You want to know why, or how we tested, or
why you perhaps shouldn’t use some of these
other dictionaries?
Keep watching!
We created six tests for each online dictionary,
based around looking up common verbs like
‘talk’, ‘go’, ‘pick’ and so on.
We chose these verbs because they have many
different meanings, as well as many phrasal
verbs and idioms based on them.
In this video, we’ll focus on the verb ‘talk’.
So, what were the six tests?
The first test was for completeness: does
the dictionary give you every definition of
a word?
The second test: does the dictionary give
you definitions of phrasal verbs, collocations
and idioms related to the word you look up?
Test three: does the dictionary explain the
difference between UK and US pronunciation
and usage?
Test four: does the dictionary explain verb
structures and complements?
For example, you can ‘talk to someone’,
‘talk with someone’, ‘talk about something’,
and ‘talk of something’.
Test five: can you look up phrasal verbs and
idioms directly?
With some dictionaries, if you try to look
up a phrasal verb like ‘put down’, it
will redirect you to the root verb, ‘put’.
This makes it harder to find the information
you need.
Good online dictionaries let you look up phrasal
verbs and idioms directly.
Test six: is the information presented in
a clear, organised way, and is the dictionary
website easy to use?
This test is more subjective, of course.
Finally, we looked for any other features
which might be useful for English learners.
Remember: if you want to see the full test
results, check out the page on our website.
If you’re watching on YouTube, you can find
a link in the video description.
So, how did our online dictionaries do?
Cambridge didn’t do very well, which is
a shame, because it had been my go-to online
dictionary before I started making this video.
Firstly, it is not complete.
It doesn’t contain all the possible definitions
of a word.
Plus, it doesn’t have a complete list of
related phrasal verbs, idioms and collocations.
On the other hand, for beginners or intermediate
learners, there are some good example sentences.
The definitions are well-written and clear.
It does also show the UK and US pronunciation
of a word, with audio, so that’s a positive.
It doesn’t clearly show verb complements
and structures.
Overall, I can’t recommend it.
One of the biggest problems is that three
different dictionaries are combined on one
page; there’s a British English dictionary,
an American dictionary, and a business English
dictionary.
This makes it confusing to use, because different
information is in different places, and not
always where you might expect it.
I won’t spend more time on it, because there
are much better dictionaries you can use.
Longman was number one in our tests.
It’s by far the most complete dictionary
I found.
It contained all the information you might
need: every definition of the word, possible
verb complements, phrasal verbs, idioms…
Everything you might need is there.
Not only that, but they have example sentences
and many example sentences have audio, at
least for some words.
That makes it a great resource for practising
pronunciation.
At the bottom of the page, they also have
a large number of examples taken from natural
English texts.
You can look up phrasal verbs and other word
combinations directly.
Even the longer phrase ‘know what you’re
talking about’ has its own entry, with dedicated
examples.
That’s impressive!
When you’re learning English, you’ll often
hear that you need to learn language in chunks.
This is good advice, so it’s great that
there are dictionaries which can help you
to do this.
There’s one minor criticism: it gives you
the UK and US pronunciations of a word, but
it doesn’t clearly show which is which.
For reference, the UK pronunciation is given
first, and the US pronunciation second.
Longman also has a number of useful features
for English learners.
If you look up a verb, you can find a verb
tense table which lists all the forms and
tenses.
Finally, it has a good thesaurus, which gives
you alternative words and also explains what
they mean, and how they’re different from
the base word.
Generally, I found Longman one of the easiest
dictionaries to use.
Information is organised and presented nicely,
and the page is relatively clean, without
unnecessary clutter.
Dictionary dot com isn’t really a dictionary
in its own right.
Instead, it collects information from many
dictionaries.
In summary, I don’t recommend it for English
learners.
It’s reasonably complete, although you won’t
find much information on idioms and collocations.
More importantly, the information is not well-organised.
A lot of info is hidden behind ‘see more’
links, but there doesn’t seem to be any
logic to what’s hidden and what’s displayed
immediately.
Plus, because it collects information from
different dictionaries on a single page, the
information is divided into different sections,
but not in a logical way.
This makes it harder to find what you need.
It doesn’t do a good job of showing related
phrasal verbs, idioms and collocations.
You also can’t look up phrasal verbs directly,
which is a big disadvantage.
Collins has some positive features.
It scored four out of five for completeness.
It has clear explanations with examples for
each definition.
However, a couple of things could be better.
Our test word – ‘talk’ – can be both
a noun and a verb.
Most dictionaries will separate the verb and
noun definitions, which makes sense.
Collins mixes them together in a list.
It’s not bad, but it seems strange, and
I think it could be confusing for some users.
Also, it gives some information about complements
and structures, but it’s not so clear.
They highlight the structures used in their
example sentences, but there’s no dedicated
information on what structures are possible
and what they mean.
Finally, like some other dictionaries in our
list, Collins tries to combine results from
different dictionaries on one page.
I think this is terrible design, because you
might not even realise there are more parts
to the page.
You see the definitions and explanations,
you get down to here, and… that looks like
the end, right?
But, then there’s more: a British dictionary,
an American dictionary, and more examples
and idioms.
Overall, not bad, but it’s not the best.
Lexico is one of the best dictionaries we
tested.
I highly recommend it, especially for learners
at an intermediate or lower level.
Even if you’re a higher-level learner, give
Lexico a try.
Why?
Because it’s so clear and well-organised.
For example, it gives you one example sentence
for each definition, but you can also click
to see more if you want.
That’s a really nice feature.
You just need a simple example?
You can have it.
You want more?
You can have that, too.
In general, Lexico does the best job of presenting
a large amount of information in a logical
way.
However, it’s also fully complete.
Only two dictionaries scored 100% in our completeness
tests: Longman and Lexico.
Plus, information on phrasal verbs, collocations
and idioms is nicely separated, and you can
look up longer phrases directly; for example,
if you look up an idiom like ‘talk the talk’
directly, you’ll find a dedicated page.
The only negative is that it doesn’t explain
the difference between UK and US pronunciation
or usage.
Overall, I also found Lexico to be the cleanest
dictionary in terms of design.
It’s a great choice for English learners.
Macmillan is slightly different, because it
puts different parts of speech on different
pages.
So, if you look up ‘talk’, you’ll see
definitions for the verb only.
The noun definitions are on a separate page,
which might not be easy to find if you’re
using a mobile or a smaller screen, because
they’re hidden in this ‘other entries’
box.
I don’t think that’s a good point.
Macmillan has some positives: it has good
information on verb complements, which is
also nicely presented, and you can look up
phrasal verbs and idioms directly.
However, it’s not complete, and it doesn’t
give any information on UK versus US pronunciation
or usage.
So, it’s in the middle.
There are better options.
I knew about Wordreference as a bilingual
dictionary.
They have many bilingual versions, aimed at
speakers or learners of European languages.
However, they also include a monolingual English
dictionary.
Is it any good?
It has some advantages, but overall,
not recommended.
Like dictionary dot com, Wordreference collects
information from multiple dictionaries, but
this means you have too much information on
one page, some of which is repeated, and it’s
hard to find what you need.
You also can’t look up phrasal verbs or
idioms directly.
If you try to look up a phrasal verb like
‘pick up’, you’ll be redirected to the
root verb – ‘pick’.
Then, you’ll have to find the definition
on the page.
Wordreference does have one excellent and
– at least in our tests – unique feature.
For pronunciation, it has audio not just for
UK and US English, but also for other regions,
such as Ireland or Jamaica.
It also includes some regional UK and US accents.
This is really useful, because actually there
isn’t just one UK pronunciation and one
US pronunciation of a word.
There are many English accents, in the UK,
US and in other English-speaking countries,
and it’s good to understand how pronunciation
is different in different parts of the world.
So, maybe use Wordreference for the pronunciation
audio, but I don’t recommend it as a dictionary.
I’ll keep this short: don’t use Chambers.
Two points: first, they print information
in a big block, like you’d find in a paper
dictionary.
That makes sense on paper, because you need
to save money and space.
On the web, there’s no reason to do this,
and it makes it harder to find what you’re
looking for.
Secondly, Chambers doesn’t seem to be aimed
at learners of English as a second language.
It doesn’t give many examples, nor does
it give information about verb complements,
phrasal verbs, and so on.
You can’t look up phrasal verbs or other
longer chunks directly.
It’s not terrible; it does the basic job
of a dictionary, but I can’t see any reason
to use it.
Merriam-Webster also doesn’t have much to
recommend it.
One major disadvantage: it doesn’t give
complete lists of phrasal verbs, idioms or
collocations when you look up a word.
For ‘talk’, it includes four phrases here, but why these
four?
Why not others?
This seems strange; if you’re going to include
some phrasal verbs or idioms, you should include
all of them.
There’s no information on UK versus US pronunciation
or usage.
There’s also no information on verb complements.
They give examples, but the examples aren’t
full sentences, making them less useful.
Finally, the design is weird.
There are all these colons and slashes in
odd places.
Maybe that doesn’t bother you, but I found
it unnecessary and a little confusing.
On the other hand, you can look up phrasal
verbs and idioms directly.
Also, it has real-life examples which are
pulled from the internet, although they aren’t
always accurately classified.
For example, some of the examples for ‘talk’
as a verb are actually the noun form.
Having reviewed these dictionaries, I’ve
switched my go-to online dictionary from Cambridge
to Longman and Lexico.
Honestly, I was surprised at how badly Cambridge
came out of these tests.
Although I think Longman is the best, I would
actually recommend Lexico for most purposes.
It gives you complete information, and it’s
so easy to use.
What about you?
Which dictionary do you use?
Are you planning to switch to a new one?
Do you have anything to add to our reviews?
Let us know in the comments!
Thanks for watching!