AirPods’ new Live Translation feature might be full of European languages, but the feature won’t be available in much of Europe

Live Translation is coming to AirPods 4, AirPods Pro 2 and AirPods Pro 3
Not available in the EU to EU-based Apple accounts
Apple says it’s because of EU regulations

One of the most impressive features of the AirPods Pro 3 is Live Translation, which offers real-time translation between several different languages – especially European ones at launch. But the feature won’t actually be available to people who live in many of those countries.

That’s also a blow for the AirPods 4 with ANC and AirPods Pro 2 owners who were expecting Live Translation to arrive in their ears with the launch of iOS 26. And it’s Apple‘s own iOS 26 page that contains the bad news.

If you’re in a country in the EU – so the UK isn’t affected – the feature has been delayed. It’s still coming, Apple says. But it won’t say when.

Why can’t Europeans use Live Translate for their own countries’ languages?

Here’s what Apple has published:

“Apple Intelligence: Live Translation with AirPods

Live Translation with AirPods is not available if you are in the EU and your Apple Account Country or Region is also in the EU”

The first available languages are:

English (United Kingdom)
English (United States)
French (France) – not available in the EU
German (Germany) – not available in the EU
Portuguese (Brazil)
Spanish (Spain) – not available in the EU

Apple AirPods Pro 3 First Look — (Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)

Speaking to Techcrunch, Apple blamed the EU’s Digital Markets Act and its interoperability requirements; apparently speculation that the delay was due to EU data protection regulations was incorrect.

The DMA is the same law that Apple said was responsible for delaying some Apple Intelligence features for European users last year.

Apple and other tech giants aren’t big fans of the DMA. Under that legislation both Apple and Meta were hit with fines earlier this year – in Apple’s case, by not allowing app developers to point to alternative offers outside Apple’s own App Store. Meta’s fine was for violating the DMA by combining their personal data from multiple services.

If you’re the cynical type you might think that it’s in Apple’s interests to make the DMA look bad to EU voters, but whatever you think of the background the big question is: when will you get Live Translation?

The short answer is that we don’t know, but it’s likely to be months rather than weeks: Apple’s EU-delayed Apple Intelligence features arrived in March 2025, five months after non-EU customers got the whole collection in iOS 18.1.