QuranCast Is Live on Google Play: The Story Behind Our Android Launch
We just went live on Google Play. Here is the honest story of why QuranCast exists, why it took an AI teacher to make it scale, and what today's Android launch means for the 370,000+ people already learning with us.
QuranCast by NEARFOLD (Dubai) is now live on Google Play. The Android app carries the same live AI Quran teacher as our web app: it listens while you recite, corrects your Tajweed in real time, and scores every verse. It's free to download, and every new user gets 10 minutes of AI teacher time at no cost.
→ Download QuranCast on Google Play
Why did I build QuranCast?
In 2019 I kept meeting the same person: someone who wanted to read the Quran properly but had no teacher. Not because they weren't sincere — because a qualified Tajweed teacher simply wasn't available at 11pm when they finally had time to practice. The platform launched in June 2020 (originally as Terteel, before rebranding to QuranCast) with human mentors reviewing recitations. It worked, and it didn't scale: real feedback took days, and mentors could only help a handful of students each.
So we made the decision that defines QuranCast today: replace the waiting with an AI teacher that is always on. Not a chatbot bolted onto a course — a live, voice-first teacher that listens silently while you recite, then gives you spoken, specific feedback: your makhraj (articulation point), your madd (elongation counts), your ghunnah, your qalqalah.
What can an AI Quran teacher actually do?
Fair question — and we prefer data to promises. We analyzed 1,008 live AI-teacher sessions containing 3,522 individual Tajweed corrections. The most common errors were madd rules, ghunnah and articulation points — precisely the mistakes a trained ear catches and corrects on the spot. That's what the AI teacher does: it listens while you recite and corrects you in the moment, the way a teacher sitting beside you would, at any hour, in any time zone.
What it can't do is replace the spiritual and artistic depth a human teacher brings to recitation and performance. We say that plainly, because trust matters more than hype when the subject is the Quran.
What's in the Android app?
The Android app brings the core learning experience to your pocket:
- Live AI teacher sessions — recite aloud, get spoken feedback and a per-verse score.
- Structured curricula — Nazira (a 29-stage reading curriculum from the Arabic alphabet to full Tajweed), Hifz (memorisation support) and My Journey (free-form practice).
- Upload and grade — record a recitation, send it for AI analysis, retry if anything fails.
- Progress that follows you — verse-level progress, scores and streaks stay in sync with the web app.
How much does QuranCast cost?
Free to download, with 10 minutes of AI teacher time included at no cost. After that it's pay-only-for-what-you-use: one-time minute packages (never a subscription) — $9.99 for 60 minutes, $24.99 for 180 minutes, $49.99 for 450 minutes. The clock only runs while the live AI teacher is actually connected, so you never pay for time you're not using.
Why Android first?
Because that's where our community is. The majority of Quran learners in our core markets are on Android, and a teacher you can't reach at the moment you're free to practice is a teacher you don't have. Android puts QuranCast in the pocket at the moment of practice. An iOS version is in development and will follow.
What's next
We're refining the teacher's pedagogy — better progression, gentler correction, more personal session context — and expanding structured curricula. If you've been waiting for a sign to finally fix that madd you've been rushing, this is it.
Download QuranCast free on Google Play — or practice on the web at qurancast.co.
About the author
Bilal Ahmad is the founder of QuranCast. He has spent 24 years in digital media, mobile games and education: creative manager on top-grossing mobile game titles at GameView Studios (DeNA), Vice President Creative at Anivista Animation Studio, visiting faculty at the National College of Arts, Lahore, and currently Division Chair of Applied Media at Higher Colleges of Technology in the UAE, where he has led the Applied Media team since 2015. He also serves as Chief Expert for 3D Digital Game Art at Emirates Skills. He began QuranCast in 2019 and holds a doctorate in applied social psychology from Maastricht University. Reach him at bilal@qurancast.co.
