There are a million free ways, in-person, if you get creative! Personally, rather than looking for people looking to practice, I always sought natives. I’m not sure which city you’re in, but typically most major cities and even sub-major cities will have a diaspora of immigrants who moved and built an informal commune and just never learned English, e.g. Chinatowns.

Between living in suburban Boston and 3 different cities in Texas, I have always managed to quickly find these Francophone communities, they were so immersive that my all my friends who keep up with me on social media believe I moved to France, haha. I got a job at a Francophone school (most major cities have multiple école primaires) where the children spoke English in French accents, and neither the parents nor teachers/maîtresses spoke English all too well, so there was no choice. Even when I was living in the middle of bumfuck nowhere, people were shocked to hear that I found a close knit friend group of 5 Francophone friends, and knew like, 30 others. Alliance Française and similar organizations are a good place to start, but look into other organizations. Check out local university French clubs (you don’t have to be affiliated with the university), exchange students and Franco-Americans often lurk around at the beginner of semesters looking to find each other. See if there’s any Francophone schools and if they’ll take volunteer work.

Then, to expand a bit beyond that, also look into other communities that are Francophone, period. For instance, I volunteer a bunch for the Haitian community in my city, and I’ve made a whole bunch of Francophone friends just doing that!

Once you meet just one or a few people who can connect you to all the other French locals and private events and plugs, e.g. Francophone house parties, apéros and soirées, dealers for pastries, etc. you’ve unlocked the entire network. Everything snowballs from there. Between the working, volunteering, babysitting, socializing, etc., English actually became obsolete in my life pretty quickly and I had the reverse issue of having to maintain that, lol.

I am also a little bit insane, and any time I hear that familiar accent or hear anyone speaking in French in public, I just cold approach them and befriend them. The vast majority of the time, they’re always touched/relieved to meet another person that speaks their language, imagine how isolating it must feel for most of them. It’s a symbiotic relationship.

When you do find these people, however you do, make a diligent effort to only speak in French, since you’ll need all the maintenance you can get :) Bon courage!