Free te reo Māori courses: online and in person

You can learn te reo Māori for nothing. Verbavia (our own course) is free online to anyone, anywhere, from the first word to B1. In New Zealand, Te Wānanga o Aotearoa, Te Whare Wānanga o Awanuiārangi and Te Wānanga o Raukawa all run fees-free te reo certificates, online and in class, for citizens and residents. The catch with the classes is the conditions, and they are set out below as of October 2026.

Updated 7 October 2026 · 9 min read

Tap 🔊 to hear an example. Māori examples play Papa Reo, the te reo Māori voice made by Te Hiku Media from recordings of native speakers.

Free te reo Māori courses at a glance

Every entry below was checked on the provider’s own page in October 2026. “Level” for the wānanga courses means the New Zealand Qualifications Framework (NZQF) level, from 1 for a complete beginner upwards; it is not the same scale as the A1–C2 levels used for European languages.

Course	Provider	Cost and conditions	Format	Level	Who it suits
Te reo Māori course	Verbavia	Free on the web for anyone anywhere; no enrolment dates	Self-paced daily lessons in any browser, including on a phone	First word to B1	Anyone who wants to start today, and class learners who want daily practice
Te Ara Reo Māori	Te Wānanga o Aotearoa	No fees; 16+, NZ citizen or resident (including Cook Islands, Niue, Tokelau) or Australian citizen or permanent resident, living in New Zealand	Online classes, part-time or full-time	NZQF 1–4	Learners in New Zealand who want a live class and a qualification
Papa Reo	Te Wānanga o Aotearoa	No fees; same conditions	Home-based or online, with a kaitiaki for support	NZQF 1	Beginners who can’t make a fixed class time
Te Kahupapa o te Reo, Te Pūtaketanga o te Reo	Te Wānanga o Aotearoa	No fees; same conditions	Classroom, with wānanga and noho marae	NZQF 1–4	Learners near a campus who want to learn in person
Te Pōkaitahi Reo	Te Whare Wānanga o Awanuiārangi	Tuition fees-free for eligible domestic learners; open entry, 16+	Face to face and blended; online options	Levels 1–6	Learners near Whakatāne, Tāmaki, Hāwera or Tauranga, or online
Poupou Huia Te Reo 1–3	Te Wānanga o Raukawa	Free for NZ citizens, domestic students and permanent residents; 17+; noho at Ōtaki	Online, with immersion hui	NZQA 4–5	Committed learners able to travel to Ōtaki
Te Pōkaitahi Reo (Reo Rua) Te Kaupae 2	Ara Institute of Canterbury	Listed as free for 2026; open entry; places limited	Classroom and marae-based, part-time for a year	Level 2	Beginners in Canterbury
Kura hāpori (community classes)	Te Ataarangi	Varies by region; “a fee may be charged”	In person, full immersion	Varies	People who want to learn by speaking, in a group
Te Whanake online resources	Te Whanake	Free online	Videos, podcasts, animations, dictionary	Beginner upwards	Self-study alongside any course

Verbavia: free for everyone, from the first word

Verbavia’s te reo Māori course is free on the web and works in any browser, including on a phone, with no residency, age or enrolment conditions and no intake to wait for. It is hand-written from the first word to the end of B1, 311 lessons, and none of its lessons is generated by AI; after the last one, the daily lesson goes back over the B1 lessons. The words come in frequency order, the order of the list of the most common Māori words, so you meet the commonest words first. The grammar is explained in English, the lessons have reading, listening and writing sections, and every example is voiced by Papa Reo, the native te reo voice made by Te Hiku Media.

What it does not have, honestly: there is no speaking section for Māori, and no teacher. A class gives you a kaiako and other people to talk to, and nothing replaces that. An optional Premium plan on the web costs US$4 a month after a 7-day trial; it removes a short ad before lessons and the limit of one language at a time. The te reo course itself costs nothing either way.

Te Wānanga o Aotearoa: free from level 1 to 4

Te Wānanga o Aotearoa lists every te reo Māori programme from level 1 to level 4 as free, as of October 2026. From Semester A 2027 it will charge fees for programmes at level 5 and above and for some at levels 3 and 4, but it says mātauranga Māori programmes at level 4 and below, including te reo Māori, will remain fees-free. It has announced seven new reo programmes for 2027, from level 1 to 7.

Entry to the free programmes is the same: you must be 16 or older, a New Zealand citizen or resident (which includes the Cook Islands, Niue and Tokelau) or an Australian citizen or permanent resident, and living in New Zealand now. Learners overseas are not eligible.

Te Ara Reo Māori, online. Level 1 part-time runs for 38 weeks: a 3-hour online class each week and about 14 hours of study on your own, for 60 credits. Full-time versions are also offered. As of October 2026 enrolment is closed and, in the wānanga’s words, “will open later this year”.
Papa Reo, level 1, home-based or online (not connected to the Papa Reo voice from Te Hiku Media). The online version takes 52 weeks at about 12 hours a week, with intakes in September, October and November 2026.
Te Kahupapa o te Reo, levels 1 and 2, in a classroom. Level 1 runs for 20 weeks: one 3-hour class a week, plus day wānanga and one noho marae ‘stay at a marae’, with about 28 hours a week of study on your own. The next intake is February 2027, with evening classes from 6pm at some campuses.
Te Pūtaketanga o te Reo, levels 3 and 4, in a classroom or as noho (residential). Level 3 starts in February 2027 at 14 campuses from Whangārei to Wellington, and in March in Ōpōtiki; you need level 2 or to pass a pre-entry assessment.

The hours are the wānanga’s own estimates, and they are the real cost of a “free” course. Level 1 part-time online is about 17 hours a week; the classroom level 1 is about 33. Choose the one you can keep up for the whole year.

Te Whare Wānanga o Awanuiārangi

Awanuiārangi, based in Whakatāne, runs Te Pōkaitahi Reo from level 1 to level 6, and lists all six among its tuition fees-free programmes for domestic learners who meet the entry requirements. “Fees-free” covers tuition only: not textbooks, equipment or other fees. Level 1 is open entry from age 16, with no Māori needed.

In 2027 level 1 runs as a 20-week course (1 February to 20 June, or 21 June to 7 November) or a 40-week course (1 February to 7 November). The campuses listed are Whakatāne, Tāmaki, Hāwera, and Tauranga and Wairoa (both subject to NZQA approval), and the course page also lists online delivery in Aotearoa and in Australia. If you live outside New Zealand, ask whether the fees-free place applies to you before you enrol.

Te Wānanga o Raukawa

Te Wānanga o Raukawa in Ōtaki offers three certificate courses, Poupou Huia Te Reo 1, 2 and 3, free for New Zealand citizens, domestic students and permanent residents; international students pay a fee. They are 20-week courses taught online, at NZQA level 4 for the first and level 5 for the other two, and the wānanga says you do not need to be a speaker of te reo to begin.

There are real conditions. Poupou Huia Te Reo 1 is for learners aged 17 and over at beginner to intermediate level, recommends about 12 hours a week, and needs you to attend the immersion hui (noho) at the wānanga in Ōtaki. It is not approved for StudyLink loans or allowances. The 2027 course runs from 8 February to 27 June.

Is Te Ataarangi free?

Not always. Te Ataarangi teaches through full immersion with coloured rods, rākau ‘sticks’, and its classes are about speaking Māori in a supportive setting, with everyone learning together at the same pace. Its community classes, kura hāpori, run in ten regions, and their times, days and levels vary by region. Te Ataarangi says they receive limited or no funding, so “a fee may be charged”; ask your regional office.

Its online programme, Te Huanui, is open to anyone in the world and is not free: $650 plus GST for a 21-week level, as of October 2026, with a two-hour Zoom class each week in small groups. For teachers, Te Ataarangi also runs Te Kura Raunui; the guide to te reo for teachers covers the options aimed at schools.

How to find a kura pō near you

A kura ‘school’ pō ‘night’, an evening reo class, is how many adults start. They are run by wānanga, polytechnics, iwi, marae and community groups, and some are free. Three reliable ways to find one:

Te Taura Whiri i te Reo Māori, the Māori Language Commission, keeps a directory of courses at reomaori.co.nz. You can search it by region and filter for free courses and night classes, as well as level and online or on-campus delivery.
Look at the evening times on your local wānanga campus. Te Wānanga o Aotearoa’s classroom courses list 6pm classes at some campuses, and Ara Institute of Canterbury’s beginners’ course is listed as free for 2026.
Ask your iwi, your local marae, or Te Ataarangi’s regional office. Many community classes are never advertised beyond a noticeboard or a Facebook page.

Are university te reo papers free?

Not usually, and less so from 2027. The government’s Fees Free scheme no longer pays for a first year of study: since 2025 it has covered only the final year of a qualification, paid after you finish. According to Inland Revenue, Fees Free ends on 31 December 2026 without transitional arrangements. From 2027 there is no general scheme that pays for a university te reo paper, so check the university’s own fees page before you enrol. For a free route with a qualification, the wānanga courses above are the ones that stay fees-free.

Free te reo Māori resources online

Verbavia: the full course above, plus a two-minute Māori vocabulary test that estimates how many words you know.
Te Whanake: John Moorfield’s free online resources, including the beginners’ television series Tōku Reo, podcasts for listening and speaking practice, and animated modules.
Te Aka Māori Dictionary: an online Māori–English dictionary, with idioms and example sentences, on the web and as an iOS and Android app.
Te Taura Whiri i te Reo Māori: free downloads at reomaori.co.nz, including word lists, a pronunciation guide and help writing your mihi, and a test of your level, Whakamātauria tō Reo Māori.

For apps beyond these, the guide to the best apps for learning Māori compares them.

Which free course should you choose?

Start with Verbavia. It is the only course here that is free to everyone, wherever they live, with no intake date, so you can do the first lesson today and keep going daily. Then, if you live in New Zealand, add a free class when the next intake opens: Te Ara Reo Māori if you need it online, Te Kahupapa o te Reo or a kura pō if you can get to a classroom, Awanuiārangi or Raukawa if you want a longer pathway. A class gives you what an app cannot: a kaiako, and people to speak with. The daily lessons give the class something to build on.

How far a beginner course takes you is a question of words; how many Māori words you need puts numbers on it, and the best way to learn Māori sets out a plan for combining a course, a class and real conversation.