From my experience, yes. I did about an hour a day total - 20 minutes on waking, 20 minutes at lunch, and 20 minutes before I go to sleep. 3 years ago, I didn't know a lick of Spanish. Now when I go, I can be a translator for my friends. It's not great, and I trip over my pronunciation a lot, but it's functional.

As to the context of article, I'm also in the group that thinks the latest Duolingo updates are the worst to come to the platform since it's inception. It's beyond awful and I honestly despise it. I frequently went back to areas I felt myself getting rusty at, and practiced those. The new "pathway" has broke that method completely. It's impossible to see previous course content clearly, essentially forcing you through poor UX design to take the next step on the pathway instead, like you're playing Candy Crush. The update spurned me to give up on my 500+ day streak and cancel my subscription over the Summer. I haven't used the app in the last 5 months.

I'm lucky enough to live in Oxford, which is renowned so having some great evening language classes. I've signed up to my first semester starting in January which I'm very much looking forward to. If it wasn't for Duolingo, any interest in furthering my language skills would not exist. I guess it's a silver lining that an awful update to my favorite app by incompetent product management and executive decisions forced me to finally peruse a formal education in Spanish. I just wish it was a amenable break-up.