6 Best Russian Audiobooks For Beginners With Study Guide [2025]

Audiobooks are an excellent resource for learning languages. I always listen to them at the beginning of my language journey. Not only did they help me to get familiar with the language and its structure, but I also grasped the pronunciation right away. I listen to everyday life dialogues set in the countries where the language is spoken or interesting stories. So it’s a win-win.

I’ve already learned 3 foreign languages and keep learning more. And these audiobooks have been part of my language journey.

So, in this article, I’ll give you 6 best Russian audiobooks for beginners to start listening and having fun with Russian.

Let’s explore them together.

6 Best Russian Audiobooks For Beginners

Here is the list of my favorite Russian audiobooks for beginners. I’ve ranked them from the easiest one to use for complete beginners to the more advanced audiobooks:

1. Learn Russian for Beginners Easily & In Your Car
2. 101 Conversations In Simple Russian
3. Short Stories In Russian
4. Conversational Russian Dialogues
5. Russian Short Stories for Beginners: Volume 1
6. Russian Short Stories for Beginners: Volume 2

1. Learn Russian For Beginners Easily & In Your Car

This book will give you a great foundation for Russian learning with its basic vocabulary. It’ll teach you simple topics from numbers to daily activities, basic verbs, colors, months, sports, feelings, and the list goes on and on.

It’ll help you familiarize yourself with the pronunciation of the words. I recommend you repeat each word out loud to practice pronouncing them right from the beginning. Each word is pronounced slowly and multiple times to help you remember it.

You’ll learn over 1500 common Russian words. Once you are confident with these words and sentences, you can jump onto the next audiobook from the list.

➡ Get Learn Russian For Beginners Easily here & start listening.

2. 101 Conversations In Simple Russian

Only Richard has done a great job incorporating day-to-day vocabulary in short dialogues. These conversations are set in typical situations, such as meeting friends, making arrangements, shopping, or having a coffee.

The audiobook contains 15,000 words in all dialogues with common vocabulary you would hear on the street in Moscow between people talking to each other.

Each conversation only contains 150 words to make it easier to keep track of the vocabulary and understand the dialogue. It also comes with a summary for you to double-check the meaning.

This book will teach you the basic phrases to communicate like a Russian local in everyday life.

➡ Get 101 Conversations In Simple Russian here & start listening.

3. Short Stories In Russian

Short Stories Russian audiobook will make you want to learn Russian daily with its engaging stories.

This audiobook includes 8 exciting stories, each written in a different genre. Some are thrillers, action-based, science fiction, fantasy, and comedy. All of them use simple, everyday vocabulary that every beginner can understand.

Take this audiobook; it’ll eliminate all possible frustrations on your language-learning journey. Its stories are entertaining and will make your Russian learning fun.

Each story also includes a bilingual list of words, plot summary, and comprehension questions to double-check your understanding.

➡ Get Short Stories In Russian here & start listening.

4. Conversational Russian Dialogues

These Conversational Russian Dialogues will take you to the next level. I particularly love this audiobook because it deals with people’s problems in their everyday lives, where two characters are trying to solve some issues.

So you’ll now challenge yourself and imagine you’re in trouble and have to solve it in Russian.

It can be any situation, from going to a doctor to finding an apartment in Moscow as an expat, booking a room, or ordering food as a traveler. Dive into these dialogues and try to solve the problems with the two characters, which will help you overcome the fear of speaking.

The audiobook contains 100 conversations in Russian, each accompanied by an English translation. It also offers a few tips and tricks for understanding and working with the story. All dialogues use simple, everyday vocabulary you’ll understand even as a beginner.

➡ Get Conversational Russian Dialogues here & start listening.

5. & 6. Russian Short Stories For Beginners: Volume 1 + Volume 2

Lastly, I recommend you go for the series of these two audiobooks, which will wrap up all the vocabulary you’ve learned as a beginner. Audiobook series are especially great because they use the same language structure and similar words. This makes it easier for you to adapt to the language style.

These audiobooks use simple vocabulary and teach you more complex travel phrases, Russian slang, and even future tense. They’ll take you from the beginner level to the intermediate.

It also includes a Russian and English summary to ensure you’ve understood the story. And it’ll challenge you with tricky questions, too. But don’t panic. There is an answer for you as well.

➡ Get Russian Short Stories For Beginners: Volume 1 here & start listening.

➡ Get Russian Short Stories For Beginners: Volume 1 here & start listening.

Where Can I Listen To Russian Audiobooks?

I’ve been using Audible to listen to audiobooks for over 2.5 years now. It’s one of the best audiobook platforms, with thousands of choices.

If you want to try my method of learning the Russian language using one of these audiobooks, sign up today for free. You’ll get 1 month of a free trial, including 1 free Russian audiobook.

After that, you only pay about $8 a month, for which you’ll get 1 audiobook.

➡ Get Audible here and start listening to Russian audiobooks.

💡 NOTE: If any of these audiobooks aren’t on Audible, try Spotify. You can also order the paperback version, which includes free audio, which is a great option, too.

Benefits Of Learning Russian With Audiobooks

Learning languages with audiobooks comes with a few benefits. Here are a few reasons why you should choose some of these Russian audiobooks to learn the language:

• help you to get familiar with the language & its pronunciation right from the start
• teach you how to pronounce words correctly
• ability to listen to them (and learn the language) when commuting to work or school
• you can learn the language while doing other activities (cleaning the house, doing sports)
• help you to memorize new vocabulary more effectively
• make you more excited about language learning

How To Learn Russian With Audiobooks

I have a specific method I use to learn languages while listening to audiobooks. Sure, it’s great to just listen to them, but it’s better to make an extra effort to learn new words, too.

So here are the steps I recommend you take when learning Russian with these audiobooks:

1. Listen to 1 section (a story or a dialogue) of the audiobook
2. Listen to it again and try to catch a few words and meaning of the story
3. Get a printed version of the audiobook
4. Highlight words you want to learn from the section
5. Translate the words you want to learn & write them down in your language notebook
6. Read the section once again and try to understand the whole context
7. Listen to the audiobook over and over until you understand it very well

Firstly, I recommend you listen to a small section of the audiobook for 10 to 15 minutes. After, listen to the same section and try to catch some words.

It’s always crucial to work with a printed version of the audiobook. So, take the printed version and try to read it independently (if you’ve already learned the Russian alphabet).

After, highlight words you want to remember from the sections. Next, take your language notebook and write this vocabulary down. Then, translate each word into your native language and write the meaning.

Then, it’s time to reread the same text with highlighted words and get familiar with it.

In the end, listen to the section repeatedly until you feel comfortable with it and understand it. Once you feel confident about the section, go for another one.

💡 PRO TIP: I also recommend listening to just one sentence, then stopping the audio and repeating the sentence aloud. This will help you practice pronunciation right from the beginning, which is essential.

BONUS: Learn The Cyrillic Script & Get More Ideas

If you are just starting to learn Russian, check out my article about the most useful Eastern European language. I have some tips for you to learn the Cyrillic script and interesting stories from my life about trying to learn Russian and seeing others learning Russian.

Click on the image below and read more about it:

Get My Language Travel Notebook

I’ve designed a language notebook for you to keep track of new vocabulary. You can write down new words as you’re listening to these audiobooks or learning in general. Whenever you forget the meaning of a word, you can return to it and memorize it again.

Click on the image below and get my language travel notebook:

FAQs

I’ve also answered some of the frequently asked questions about Russian learning and audiobooks in general. So check my answers below:

What To Listen To Learn Russian?

101 Conversations in Simple Russian or Learn Russian for Beginners Easily & In Your Car are the best audiobooks for learning Russian. They use simple vocabulary in everyday dialogues, which makes them easy to understand and prepares you to speak in daily situations.

Can You Learn Russian By Reading Books?

Absolutely. Books are a great resource as you’ll learn new vocabulary, see how the words are written, get familiar with the language, and learn how to use the vocabulary in sentences. The more you read, the more Russian you’ll learn and the more flexible you’ll be in using the language.

Why Is Russian Considered Hard To Learn?

It uses Cyrillic script, which is difficult to learn. It’s a Slavic language, so it has different principles and sentences, including a different accent, than the Latin languages that most people in the world are used to.

Is Learning Russian Good For Your Brain?

Yes, any language is great to learn for your brain. You’re training your brain to memorize and remember new words and think in a completely different language, which is perfect for your brain.

WRAP-UP: Best Russian Audiobooks For Beginners

These are my favorite Russian audiobooks, which I recommend you incorporate into your language journey. Follow the steps I suggest to learn new words along the way. It can be tempting just to listen to an audiobook while you’re doing other activities, but then we happen to sometimes ignore the content. So, I recommend focusing more and also working with the printed version to learn new words.

If you need help with language learning or have any questions, please email me at info(at)voicesoftravel.com.

Happy Listening!