Global Luka vs. Europe Luka
Like two peas in a pod… but not.
Luka can be bought all over the world but… did you know: there are different regional versions of Luka? If you’re living in the EU or UK, the Luka closest to you is likely to be the Europe Luka sold by the German distributor! At first glance, there’s no difference at all… until you look at what they do!
Contents
Before we begin… I should make this disclaimer extremely clear: we are a partner bookshop with Luka Reads. However, I have tried my utmost to provide an impartial review of the regional Lukas in comparison. I really hope those efforts have been demonstrated in the review! Let me know if you have any concerns, though - always keen to make improvements and edits/updates where needs be.
A quick summary
Here’s a table that pretty much summarises the main similarities and differences between the Europe and Global Luka.
You can click or tap on any cell in the table to read more about it!
I use some terms quite specifically (for instance, a recording refers only to book recordings that play on Luka when you have a physical book) and there are some terms that I need to clarify… so, here’s a glossary
Global Luka: the Luka distributed by our partner, Luka Reads in Singapore
Europe Luka: the Luka distributed by World of Luka in Germany
Recording: a recording of a book that Luka can read
Library: all recordings available on a Luka
Audiobook: a recording that can be played without the physical book
Audio: any audio that isn’t a recording (i.e. audiobooks and music)
App library: the place where you download apps (e.g. Apple’s App Store or Google’s Play Store); there are different app libraries in different countries
Luka App
Depending on where you are in the world, you'll be accessing a different app library. The Luka App on the UK/EU app libraries is different to the Luka App you get in another country's app library.
This is really important because you can only use a Luka with its respective app! In other words, you can only use an Europe Luka with the UK/EU Luka App and you can only use a Global Luka with the Global Luka App.
There are certainly ways to gain access to another country's app library if, say, you wanted to download the Global Luka App but are living in the UK. Doing this is fairly easy on both Android and iOS!
If you want to read a book with Luka, you will need access to the recording. On the UK/EU Luka App, you have to purchase each recording separately for Luka to read them. However, on the Global Luka App, all recordings are immediately available for free.
Apart from that (quite crucial) difference, the other app features are very similar. You can:
search for books by title, author, or ISBN.
search and discover books by category.
view a report of your child’s reading activity.
add people to your family circle which grants them control over the Luka, too.
send preset messages that Luka will say (e.g. “Go to sleep”).
manage audiobooks and music on your Luka
make self-recordings of any book (even if it isn’t on the library) for free.
The self-recording feature of the app may, arguably, be the most useful one available. And this is purely because you can make any self-recording of any book regardless of whether that book is available through the library or not. So, that means you can just scan any book you fancy… and, voila! You can record your own voice over the pages and it’ll read just like any other book once everything is ready. It’s great that they’ve kept this feature the same on both the UK/EU and Global app - much appreciated!
In our opinion, the crucial difference is whether you have to pay to gain access to the recordings and this may, or may not, be a dealbreaker for you. Otherwise, the UK/EU app and the Global app are very similar with the features that they offer but, as you’ll read later in this comparison, the range offered within each feature varies a lot and this may also affect your final decision.
Luka Library
The Europe Luka library is mainly focusing on expanding its German library at the moment. Since it was launched in 2020, the German library has grown to over 400 books. On the other hand, the library currently consists of only 31 Chinese books and 45 English books. There are also other languages like Arabian, Dutch, French, Italian but some of these libraries have only 2 books and others have about 50.
The Global Luka library is mainly focusing on expanding its Chinese library but also has a very extensive English library which is always expanding, too. At the time of writing this, there are only two languages available on the Global Luka library. There are over 70,000 Chinese books and over 20,000 English books.
You can search for a book by title, author, or ISBN in both apps but the types and the number they have to offer differ between Global and Europe Lukas.
I'm going to pause here for a moment to compare the two. While the Europe Luka library has a wider range of languages, the Global Luka certainly has a more specialised and extensive library for Chinese and English. So the final decision should really come down to your situation at home. If you're looking for German books, go for the Europe Luka. But if you're looking for Chinese and/or English books, the Global Luka is definitely the way to go.
As a side note for those specifically looking for Chinese books and recordings, we've often found that having a bigger library to choose from helps us tailor our library to our personal preferences. Nonetheless, the Chinese books available on the Global Luka library has quite a few nice selections!
Other Luka features
Luka is able to talk in another language other than English but the other choice of language differs depending on what Luka you have. The Europe Luka can talk in either English or German; the Global Luka can talk in English or Mandarin Chinese. For both Lukas, the language is selected through the app under 'Settings'. Easy!
Aside from reading, Luka can also function like a sort of radio controlled by the app. You'll be able to choose from a selection of audiobooks. As always, the selection varies greatly depending on what app you're using.
The Global Luka App has a wide range of different topics to choose from and various audiobooks that target different Mandarin Chinese proficiency levels. It's a little late to late to add now: but, these audiobooks are only (or mainly? I haven't checked every single one) in Mandarin Chinese. The UK/EU Luka App allows you to choose from a small handful of audiobooks and recordings but these are available in German rather than in Mandarin Chinese.
Just like most radios, Luka will be able to play music chosen from the Luka app. And, like the audiobooks, this selection varies depending on which app you have.
The main difference is the languages that the music is available in. While you can get some children's songs in German on the Europe Luka, you can get a whole variety of genres and langauges for music on the Global Luka. These languages include: English, Mandarin Chinese, Cantonese, Japanese, Korean and a handful of French and German songs, too. The genres are also quite wide-ranging, and even suitable for adults. (Ranging from K-pop to classical, and from mandopop to rock!)
If you own a Global Luka, there is, apparently, a way to get your own audio playing on Luka via the Luka Cloud (at cloud.ling.cn). As far as I know, you receive about 2 GB of storage space (about 46 hours of audio) and you can upload anything as long as it is an MP3 file with a sample rate less than 128 kbps.
That said, I haven't been able to actually get this to work yet - and I'm not sure why. My guess is that their servers are only available to certain countries, which means you can't upload anything unless you're in the right country. But that's just a guess! The concept is really cool and I'm looking forward to the day they expand their servers to include more countries! But... for now, it's not so helpful.
There may not be a timetabling feature in the Europe Luka but, considering the audiobooks and music are a little limited, it's probably not necessary. However, with the huge selection of audiobooks and music available on the Global Luka, the timetabling feature is really helpful. The Global Luka App will provide a timetable that breaks down the typical day into half-hour slots. You can then schedule particular music or audiobooks to play in those slots. This way, if your Luka is on standby during those times, you just have to push play on your app rather than searching and queueing each item.
Perhaps, overall, one of the questions you must ask yourself is: if I were to use these audio resources, which language do I want to prioritise? As it stands, the Global Luka audio selection definitely win on the basis of variety and, thus, utility. In my opinion, having the wider range of audiobooks makes using Luka more varied and interesting for children.
In addition, probably buying the Europe Luka based on the audio resources may not be the wisest decision because the range available is lacking slightly, at the moment. This isn't to say that the Europe Luka will never improve. We expect that the Europe Luka will work on adding more audio to their selection but we also expect that to be pretty low on the priority list in comparison to expanding their library - and probably rightly so (it is the 'Reading Robot Companion', after all).
Conclusion
The region versions of Luka have always caused a bit of confusion for people trying to buy one - hence, this review! It’s pretty clear that the Global Luka and the Europe Luka are on different paths at present. While the Europe Luka seems to be working on expanding its German library ever since it launched in 2020, the Global Luka already has quite an established library of Mandarin Chinese and English recordings.
If you’ve been thinking of buying a Luka, you may or may not have been aware of the regional Lukas. This comparison review should help you decide which Luka will best fulfill the purpose your Luka will serve, how you intend to use it and how Luka is meant to fit into your bi- or multilingual environment.
In general, if you’re looking for a developed Chinese and/or English library, we often recommend the Global Luka without batting an eyelid because it combines free access to their massive library with a sizable variety of other resources. But, those looking for a German library (or perhaps some other continental European language - I’d double-check with the Luka Europe team, though) are almost certainly better off with a Europe Luka. Nonetheless, every household situation is unique, so it’s important that this final decision is yours to make.
Where to buy:
Global Luka (Singapore distributor): Luka Reads (www.lukareads.com) - don’t forget, use DEZIREMI20OFF to get $20 SGD off your order
Europe Luka (German distributor): World of Luka (www.luka-world.com/en)
A little side note if you’re thinking of buying the Global Luka…
Now that we’ve cleared up the regional Luka differences, you should also know that Luka Reads (our partner) sell different types of Luka (Basic, Mini, Hero) that are designed to fulfill slightly different purposes. Here are some detailed comparisons by other wonderful bloggers:
Luka Mini vs. Luka Basic on LahLahBanana’s blog
Luka Hero vs. Luka Basic on LahLahBanana’s blog
Luka Hero vs. Luka Basic on Chalk Academy’s blog
I hope that was helpful! There may be things that I’ve missed out or forgotten about. If that’s so, please don’t hesitate to comment below with your feedback!
Buying a Luka can feel like a big step forwards for your bi- or multilingual library, but it’s also a great one! We’ve gotten plenty of use out of our Luka over the last year and we’re still loving it!
You might be worried about not being able to download the correct app or about learning to use Luka, but both the Europe Luka team and the Global Luka team (Luka Reads in Singapore) are very friendly and are always willing to help.
In any case, we’ll be here to answer any questions you may have, too! We’re always happy to help, discuss or give suggestions to our customers if they ever need it.
I’ll round this off by wishing you the best on your language journey! We hope we’ll see you around!