I put AirPods’ new Live Translation feature to the test and came away impressed with the results.
I tested the feature with the help of Niléane, a native French speaker and fellow tech blogger. While we hit a few stumbling blocks in our conversation, we were able to have a perfectly good chat for a solid 10 minutes.
I cut it down to a seven-minute video, where you can see it for yourself. Keep reading for my full thoughts and analysis of the fantastic new feature.
AiPods Pro 3 Live Translation test
The AirPods’ new Live Translation feature grabbed headlines when Apple announced it — for good reason. Instant universal translators are the stuff of science fiction. And now Apple has made this a reality. But how well does it work?
The feature depends on Apple’s Translate app and it’s somewhat limited right now. AirPods Live Translation currently only works in French, English (U.S. and U.K.), German, Spanish and Portuguese. More languages are coming in iOS 26.1, though: Japanese, Korean, Italian and Chinese (both traditional and simplified).
It’s also not limited to Apple’s latest earbuds. Live Translation feature works with AirPods Pro 2 and 3, as well as AirPods 4 (with active noise cancellation). It requires an iPhone with Apple Intelligence (an iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 16 or later) running iOS 26.
Setting up an AirPods Live Translation test
To try out the feature, not knowing anybody who lives nearby who can speak fluent French, I set up a video call with someone who does. Niléane is a contributor to MacStories and hosts the Comfort Zone podcast — and is a fluent French native. I played her audio out loud through my speakers, so as far as the AirPods were concerned, I was talking to her in person.
But translation goes both ways — it also translates my English into French, which I can show someone on my phone screen. Niléane muted my audio, so she was dependent on reading my translations to simulate being a non-English speaker.
It took a while to get our setup ready, but it worked very well.
Live Translation quality
Screenshot: D. Griffin Jones/Cult of Mac
To my surprise, we seemed to have a very coherent conversation. The translations weren’t strictly accurate, but for the most part, we each understood what the other was trying to say.
For me, it felt like talking to an almost-fluent English speaker. Some of the translations were phrased a bit stiffly or robotically, but they were always intelligible.
A few of the things I said, however, were misunderstood. One mistake came right at the beginning. I apologized for starting the conversation with a meandering “word salad,” but tried to recover by asking, “What is your favorite type of salad, while we’re at it?” That was translated as, “What’s your favorite type of salad when he’s a rabbit?” That obviously didn’t make much sense to Niléane.
But to be fair, I was intentionally trying to push the limits, talking completely naturally and somewhat quickly. (It’s also the sort of mistake that would be caught immediately.) If I were actually in France, I would probably try speaking in simpler sentences to ensure my English was easily translated.
It all depends on accurate transcriptions
Photo: Apple
Our little stumbling block is a good reminder that for Live Translation to work, it first needs to accurately turn your speech into text. If it mishears you in the first place, it’ll translate that mistake into something worse.
If you regularly use your iPhone to quickly dictate a text message, you probably already know that rushing through words in your natural speaking voice is exactly how to get the worst results. Live Translation with AirPods can fool you into forgetting that you’re actually talking to your computer.
It’s also a little slow
Another problem is somewhat inherent to the AirPods’ Live Translation technology: the awkward pause between when someone is done speaking and you’re still receiving (or waiting for) the translation. Some phrases change their meaning when you get to the end, and different languages often use different sentence structures, so the machine must wait until you finish talking before it can work its translation magic.
You can download languages to your iPhone, so you don’t need to worry about your cell signal slowing you down further. Although if you do this, accuracy will take a slight hit. You probably need to balance your connection with the importance of the conversation.
Live Translation with AirPods: Final thoughts after a thorough test
In our AirPods Live Translation test, Niléane and I pushed the system hard, and yet we still had a pretty good dialogue. There weren’t any obvious mistakes in the translations after that. We spoke about some of the differences in culture with regard to learning second languages in our countries, and why the AirPods Live Translation feature isn’t available for EU users. Finally, I had to hear her take on the iPhone 17 Pro’s cosmic orange color.
I can imagine this being a handy tool the next time I travel abroad.
Check out the other new features of the AirPods Pro 3 in my full review.
