Easy Spanish News for Beginners: Best Sources by Level

You open a Spanish news site, pick a headline you understand, and the first sentence runs thirty words with two subordinate clauses and an acronym. By the third paragraph you're translating word by word, and the story has stopped being news. It's become homework.

There's a better way in. Some sources write the news for learners: shorter sentences, everyday words, the audio read slowly next to the text. Others are real news in formats short enough to handle, with subtitles or a transcript. This guide sorts both kinds by level, from A2 to the jump into native news, with what's free, what has audio, a transcript or a glossary, and how often each one actually publishes. If listening is your thing, our lists of Spanish podcasts by level and Spanish podcasts with transcripts go deeper on audio. At the end there's a routine for the step most learners skip: going from reading a story to talking about it.

The short version: at A2, read news written in simple Spanish (Planeta Fácil, Hola Qué Pasa, Spanish in Levels), with the audio on. At B1, add a short podcast with a free transcript, like News in Easy Spanish, and the weekly news episode of Hoy Hablamos or News in Slow Spanish. Once a learner story makes sense on the first listen, move to short native clips that come with text: DW Español, N+ Univision, BBC News Mundo. And every day, retell one story out loud and say what you think about it.

How We Checked (October 22, 2026)

Every source below was checked on October 22, 2026, on its own website and podcast feeds: that it still publishes (we looked at the newest story and how often new ones appear), whether it's free, whether it has audio, a transcript or a glossary, and who makes it. An adversarial second check went back over each one to catch what the first missed. Four rules for reading the list:

• Levels. When a source states a level (A1, A2, B1, or its own scale), we give it. When it doesn't, the level is our estimate, and we say so. If the levels are new to you, Spanish levels explained covers what each one means, and our free level test takes three to five minutes.
• Accents. We only describe an accent or an edition when the source states it, like News in Slow Spanish's Spain and Latino editions. Otherwise we say where the source is made, which is not the same thing.
• Prices. We say whether a source is free or paid, and what the free part includes. We don't list prices: they change, and some vary by country.
• AI. When a source says it uses AI to write texts, record voices or make transcripts, we say so. Several of the newer ones do.

The Quick List

A2: News in Simple Spanish

At A2 the problem with real news isn't the topics, it's the sentences. The first three sources below keep the topics and cut the sentences down, and all three put the text and the audio on the same page. The two podcasts after them, LinguaWire and News in Slow Spanish, keep the full transcript for paying subscribers.

Planeta Fácil

The easiest real news we found, and it isn't made for language learners at all. Plena inclusión, a Spanish nonprofit for people with intellectual disabilities, publishes easy-read news (lectura fácil) almost every day: one short idea per line, everyday words, questions as subheadings. Most stories are easy-read summaries of an article from another outlet, such as El País, with a link to the original, and nearly all end with a glossary that explains the hard words in simple Spanish. A button reads the text aloud.

The topics are adult current affairs, from strikes to artificial intelligence. Planeta Fácil also has a monthly podcast and a monthly TV program, both on its site.

Level: our estimate, A2 (it uses no learner levels). Cost: free to read, no account. Made in: Spain.

Hola Qué Pasa

A free site of short news stories written for Spanish learners, at two levels: Easy ("the most simple Spanish possible," in the site's words) and Intermediate. One new story comes out every day, at one of the two levels, so neither level gets a story every single day. Each story has an audio player at the top, and some key phrases open a pop-up with their English translation. At the end, links point to grammar lessons for the structures in the story. The audio also comes out daily as a podcast, about 3 to 6 minutes per episode.

Level: Easy is about A2 and Intermediate about B1 (our estimate). Cost: free, no account.

Spanish in Levels

The same world-news story, rewritten at three levels that the site defines by vocabulary size: Level 1 if you know up to 1,000 words, Level 2 for 1,000 to 2,000, Level 3 for 2,000 to 3,000. New stories come out on weekdays, about eight a week, each at all three levels, with an audio player with speed control right below the text. The site's method is simple: listen while you read, then listen again without the text.

Two things to know. Each level ends with one comprehension question, and it can be much harder than the text above it. And Level 3 embeds the original video, which is often in English. It's run by a company in the Czech Republic that also makes News in Levels, and the site doesn't say which variety of Spanish it uses.

Level: our estimate, Level 1 about A2, Level 2 about B1. Cost: free, with ads.

LinguaWire's daily news podcasts

A British company founded in 2026 publishes one news podcast per level: A1, A2 and B1+ (plus an A0–A1 class explained in English). Each episode covers two stories, from that day's news except on Sundays, when it's two stories from the Spanish-speaking world that week. The levels often share the lead story, so you can hear the same news one level up. Recent A2 episodes run about 6 to 10 minutes; B1+ about 8 to 12. All three published a new episode on October 22, and they've come out daily for months.

The audio is free in any podcast app, and the episode notes list three key words with their English. On the website, though, you only see the start of each transcript: the full transcript, the translation and the exercises come with the paid plan, after a two-week trial that asks for a card. On the website, the episode player carries an "AI Generated" label, and LinguaWire says it uses AI across its daily scripts, recordings and exercises, and that native speakers on its team review and edit the content. It doesn't state an accent.

Level: stated by the source (A1, A2, B1+). Cost: free audio; site features paid.

News in Slow Spanish

From a US company, a weekly news show at three levels: the site labels them Beginner (A1–A2), Intermediate (B1–B2) and a top level for C1 and up. It comes in two editions, Spain and Latino, which is the clearest accent choice on this page. The Intermediate show has two hosts discussing the week's stories; the player lets you slow the audio down.

It's a paid subscription with a 7-day free trial for new subscribers. Without paying, every episode page shows the opening segments, with pop-up English translations of many words and phrases, and the show has free podcast feeds. The full transcripts, quizzes and grammar lessons are for subscribers. Its AI transparency notice says some content may be generated or modified by AI and may not be reviewed by a person before publication.

Level: stated by the source. Cost: paid, with free excerpts.

B1: Real News, Still Slowed Down

At B1 you can handle real news if it's short and you have the text. These sources are still made for learners, or are short enough to replay.

News in Easy Spanish (Lingopie)

A free podcast from Lingopie, under five minutes per episode, covering four or five world headlines in what the show calls "clear, slow Spanish." It has come out about daily since June 2026. Every episode since August 3, 2026, and most older ones, has a free Spanish transcript on its page, and recent episodes list three to five key words (without translations). There are no level labels; recent episodes also include a short promo for a Lingopie trial.

Level: our estimate, A2–B1: slow and short, but the transcripts use the past subjunctive. Cost: free, no account.

Hoy Hablamos, "Noticias en español"

Hoy Hablamos is a learner podcast made in Spain (in Galicia) that publishes every weekday, and every Thursday's episode is the news: three stories picked from Spanish news outlets, in about 10 to 13 minutes, all in Spanish. The full audio is free on the site, where the player goes from 0.75x to 2x, and in podcast apps. The transcript and exercises are paid; the free page shows the first paragraph and links to the original stories. Its own label is nivel intermedio-avanzado.

Level: our estimate, B1 and up. Cost: free audio, paid transcript.

La ONU en minutos

UN News' Spanish roundup: about 5 to 9 minutes on weekdays, about the UN's work around the world, with breaks: there was no regular episode from August 3 to September 7, 2026, or from September 22 to 25. It's free, and you can download each episode. There's no transcript, only a two-to-four-sentence summary of the headlines on each episode page. Read the summary first and the audio gets much easier, and many topics come back from one day to the next.

Level: our estimate, B1 with the summary, B2 without. Cost: free.

B1+ and Up: Native News With Support

The jump to native news is easier with two things: short clips, and text you can check. Every source here has at least one of the two.

N+ Univision

The news site of the US Spanish-language network (called Noticias Univision until January 2026) has short video clips, mostly under three minutes, on US topics: weather, immigration, local stories. Below each clip is a free "Leer transcripción" button with the full text. The site warns that the transcript is generated by AI and can contain errors, and they show: the channel's own name comes out as "n más univision," some sentences are garbled, and English speech turns into nonsense. The whole transcript is also shown in capital letters. Use it to check, not to study.

Level: our estimate, B1+ for the short clips with the transcript. Cost: free.

DW Español

Deutsche Welle's Spanish service makes short news clips, about 1.5 to 4 minutes, on international news, the Americas and Germany. On dw.com, nearly every short news clip we checked had a full Spanish subtitle track (with a few typos), but the clips go up there in batches, often a week or more after the story aired. YouTube gets new clips every day, but their captions are almost always automatic: use dw.com for subtitled practice and YouTube for today's news. The long political talk shows we checked had no subtitles.

Level: our estimate, B1+ for the short clips. Cost: free.

BBC News Mundo

Free to read, several new articles a day, and the most useful part for learners is the short videos with a presenter: most run under three minutes, and some of the ones we checked had Spanish subtitles in the picture. The articles themselves are native journalism, closer to B2. There's also a free weekly newsletter on Fridays.

Level: our estimate, B1+ for the videos, B2 for the articles. Cost: free.

CNN 5 Cosas

CNN en Español's news podcast: five stories in about 4 to 7 minutes, twice a day on weekdays and once a day on weekends. It's free, with ads. There is no transcript or glossary: this is native-speed news for native listeners. It works best as a second listen, after you've read about the same stories somewhere easier.

Level: our estimate, B1+ to B2. Cost: free.

France 24, "En 5 minutos"

A weekly explainer video, about 5 minutes, on one question: who invented taxes, why a trade route matters. The topics are the kind you can argue about, which makes it good material for the opinion step in the routine below. It's free on France 24's site and YouTube; the only subtitles are YouTube's automatic Spanish captions. It came out almost every Tuesday from April to early September 2026, then skipped three weeks in a row; it came back on October 6, but the October 20 episode still wasn't in the show's feed on October 22.

Level: our estimate, B1+ to B2. Cost: free.

Lo que hay que saber (La Nación)

The Argentine newspaper La Nación's 2-minute news podcast: about five stories, in a morning and an afternoon edition every weekday, plus a longer weekly roundup. Most morning editions also come out as a written article on the paper's site, which has a metered paywall. It's dense with Argentine politics and economics, so it's a stretch, but two minutes is easy to replay.

Level: our estimate, B2. Cost: free podcast.

RTVE: Telediario and Noticias RNE

Spain's public broadcaster. The TV news, Telediario, is on RTVE Play with Spanish subtitles, which makes it the easier way in. The radio bulletins of Noticias RNE are short (about 3 to 5 minutes, many times a day) but have no transcript.

Level: our estimate, B2. Cost: free.

El hilo

A weekly podcast from Radio Ambulante Studios, every Friday, on Latin America and the Latino community in the US: a host talks with local journalists about one story, for about 30 to 50 minutes. It's the hardest source here, and the best one for following a story in depth. Each episode page has a Spanish transcript and an English translation, which the show says is made with the help of AI and reviewed by its team.

Level: our estimate, B2. Cost: free.

Sites and Apps That Rewrite the News for Learners

A newer kind of source takes a real article and rewrites it at your level, often with AI. It can be good reading practice, but know what you're getting:

• The Easy Spanish News started in October 2026: one story a day in A1, A2 and B1 versions plus the original, free, with a translation for any word you tap. The site says the A1 to B1 versions are written by AI, and the read-aloud uses your device's built-in voice, not a recording.
• Newslang is an app that switches an article between A1 and B2 and reads it aloud. Its terms say it uses AI both to write the text and for the voice. It's free to download, with a paid Pro plan.
• Readle turns articles from outlets like Reuters and the BBC into short graded stories with audio and translations, one new story a day. But the articles behind them were months old in our check, so it's reading practice, not current news. Most stories are behind a subscription.

AI rewrites can simplify a sentence and change its meaning along the way. For anything that matters, check the original story.

Still Recommended, but Gone, Frozen or Out of Reach

Several sources that other lists still recommend have closed, stopped publishing or aren't open to individual learners. As of October 22, 2026:

• Practica Español, the learner news site from the Spanish agency EFE, closed in October 2021. EFE's own notice says it was closed permanently.
• Noticias Fácil, an easy-read news site, hasn't published since 2021, and its old address is a parked domain. Planeta Fácil, above, is a different and active project.
• Voz de América in Spanish hasn't published a news article since March 2025.
• VeinteMundos, a learner magazine with audio, stopped around 2019; its old address no longer shows the magazine, and in 2025 it served an unrelated gambling site.
• Spanish NewsBites' address is now a parked domain.
• EasySpanishNews.com is still online and free, but its newest story is from October 2025.
• Newsela has Spanish articles at five reading levels, but it's built for schools: an adult learner can't sign up on their own.

How to Read a Spanish Headline

News Spanish has its own shorthand, and most of it lives in the headline. Four habits explain most of the confusion:

And a few words that look like English and aren't:

From Reading the News to Talking About It: a 20-Minute Routine

Reading a story in Spanish and talking about it are two different skills, and most learners stop after the first. This routine takes one story a day from your eyes to your mouth.

1. Pick a story you already know something about (2 minutes). A topic you've seen in English this week is the easiest start: you already know who and what, so your attention goes to the Spanish.

2. First pass for the gist (5 minutes). Read or listen once without stopping. Then answer, out loud and in Spanish, the questions every news story answers: ¿Qué pasó? ¿Dónde? ¿Quién? ¿Cuándo? Short answers are fine: "Hubo un incendio en Chile."

3. Second pass with help (5 minutes). Now use the transcript, the glossary or the slower version. Pick five words you'd need to tell the story, mostly verbs (anunció, subió, detuvieron), not every word you didn't know.

4. Retell it in five sentences (3 minutes). Out loud, without looking. At A2, the past tense carries it: "Ayer el Gobierno de España anunció…" At B1, add the source and some distance: "Según el diario, …", "Parece que…".

5. Give your opinion, and defend it (5 minutes). This is the step that's easiest to skip, and it's the one a conversation needs. Use the frames below for your level, then answer the follow-up questions in the next table as if someone had just asked them.

Opinion Frames by Level

For six more prompts with model answers, from stating an opinion to wrapping up a discussion, try our speaking practice on giving your opinion in Spanish.

What They'll Ask You Back

In a real conversation, your opinion is where the talking starts, not where it ends. These are the follow-ups to expect, and a way to answer each:

You'll hear ¿Viste lo de…? across Latin America; in most of Spain the usual form is ¿Has visto lo de…?, and the answer would be Sí, lo he leído esta mañana.

What Can Go Wrong

• The story is political and you'd rather not go there. "Prefiero no hablar de política, pero lo que sí me parece interesante es…" steers to a safer part of the same story. It's a normal thing to say, not rude.
• You agree with everything because disagreeing feels rude. Polite disagreement is ordinary in Spanish: "Entiendo lo que dices, pero yo lo veo diferente." Practice it until it comes out without a pause.
• You understood the story but freeze when someone asks about it. That's the gap between understanding and speaking, and only speaking closes it. Step 5 of the routine, out loud, every day, is the minimum.
• You lose the thread of their answer. Ask: "¿Me lo puedes decir de otra forma?" (Can you say it another way?) It keeps the conversation going and gets you simpler Spanish.
• You trust an AI rewrite or an automatic transcript too much. They're good for practice and bad for facts. If a detail matters, check the original story.

What the News Can't Do: Make You Speak

Following the news in Spanish does something a textbook can't: it gives you a reason to read every day, on topics adults actually talk about. After a few weeks, the words that come back story after story (según, el Gobierno, la medida, los datos) stop being obstacles.

It won't make you speak. Reading and listening are input, and input alone rarely turns into the ability to give your opinion in real time. That's why so many people understand almost everything and still freeze when it's their turn to talk. You can start on your own: after the routine, paste this into ChatGPT or any AI assistant:

I just read a Spanish news story about [topic], and my level is [A2 / B1]. I'm going to retell it in Spanish in five sentences and then give my opinion. Correct my Spanish one sentence at a time, with a short explanation in English. Then disagree with my opinion in simple Spanish and ask me two follow-up questions, like a friend would, and correct my answers too.

And when you want a real person on the other side of the table, that's what Spanish Fluency Club is for: 25+ live classes a week with native teachers, grouped by level, for $20/month. Start the 7-day free trial and bring this week's story to a conversation class. For more topics that keep a discussion going, see intermediate Spanish conversation topics.

Frequently Asked Questions

Where can I read easy Spanish news for free?

Three free sites put the news into simpler Spanish. Planeta Fácil publishes easy-read news almost every day (it's written for people with intellectual disabilities, not for learners), with a glossary at the end of nearly every story. Hola Qué Pasa posts one short story a day, at an Easy or an Intermediate level, with audio and English translations of key phrases. Spanish in Levels rewrites each story at three levels on weekdays, with audio for every level. None of them needs an account.

Is there a slow Spanish news podcast?

Yes. News in Slow Spanish is a weekly show at three levels, from beginner to C1, in a Spain or a Latino edition, with a paid subscription and free excerpts. Two free options: News in Easy Spanish, from Lingopie, runs under five minutes in what it calls clear, slow Spanish, with a free transcript on every episode since August 2026 and on most older ones; and LinguaWire publishes a free daily news podcast at A1, A2 and B1+, though the full transcripts on its site are paid. For more shows at every level, see Spanish podcasts by level.

What Spanish news should a beginner start with?

At A2, start with news written for learners or in easy-read Spanish: Planeta Fácil, the Easy stories on Hola Qué Pasa, or Level 1 on Spanish in Levels. Read the text and listen to the audio together. If you are still at A1, a learner podcast at your level, such as LinguaWire's A1 show or the Beginner program of News in Slow Spanish, is easier than any written news.

When should I switch to real Spanish news?

When you can get the main point of a learner story on the first listen, without the transcript, try one short native clip a day that comes with text: DW Español's news clips with Spanish subtitles on dw.com, the short videos on N+ Univision with their transcript, or a BBC News Mundo article on a story you already know in English. Keep one learner source going while you make the jump.

How do I use the news to practice speaking Spanish?

Turn each story into a short talk. Read or listen once for the gist, then once with the transcript, and pick five words you need to retell it. Retell it out loud in five sentences, then give your opinion with a frame like "Creo que… porque…" or, at B1, "No creo que sea…". Finish by answering the questions a person would ask you back, like "¿Y tú qué opinas?" or "¿Qué harías tú?". Doing this with a real person is what turns it into conversation practice.

Which Spanish news sources have transcripts?

Free: Hola Qué Pasa, Spanish in Levels and Planeta Fácil (the text is on the page with the audio), News in Easy Spanish (a Spanish transcript on every episode page since August 2026, and on most older ones) and El hilo (a Spanish transcript and an English translation on each episode page). N+ Univision adds a free transcript to its video clips, but it is AI-generated and the site warns it can contain errors. Paid: News in Slow Spanish, Hoy Hablamos and LinguaWire keep the full transcript for subscribers. More on how to use them in Spanish podcasts with transcripts.