Dubbing: Translate and Localize Any Video

What Dubbing Studio Does

Dubbing Studio takes a video or audio file, translates the speech into a target language, and regenerates the audio using voice models that preserve each speaker's original vocal character. The output sounds like the original speaker is fluently delivering the translated content — not a generic AI narrator reading a translation.

This is a meaningful step up from automatic subtitles. A dubbed video can reach audiences who prefer to hear content in their native language rather than read subtitles. For content creators, it turns a single English video into content that can reach Spanish, French, German, Portuguese, Japanese, and other language audiences with relatively little effort.

The Two Modes

Automatic mode is the fastest path. Upload your file, choose a target language, click generate. ElevenLabs handles everything: transcription, translation, voice matching, timing, and rendering. The output is ready in minutes. Automatic mode is best when you want a quick draft to evaluate quality or when the content does not require precise editorial control.

Studio mode gives you an editable transcript alongside the translation. Before final render you can review each line, correct idioms that translated awkwardly, lock proper nouns (names, brand terms, technical vocabulary) that should not be translated, adjust timing for lines that run long in the target language, and review each speaker's voice settings independently. Studio mode takes more time but produces a significantly more polished result.

How Speaker Voice Matching Works

Dubbing Studio isolates each speaker's voice in the original audio and creates a temporary voice model for each one. The translated audio is then generated using those models, so the translated speech carries the original speaker's pitch, tone, and pace. On multi-speaker recordings — interviews, panel discussions, conversations — each speaker gets their own model and the output preserves who is speaking throughout.

What Dubbing Does Not Do

Dubbing is audio-first. The video track is not modified. If your video shows a talking head, the speaker's lips will still be moving with the original language while the dubbed audio plays. For a voiceover-heavy video — a documentary, a presentation, a screen recording — this is usually not a problem. For a video where lip sync matters, you will need a separate lip-sync tool applied after dubbing.

Output quality also depends on the input. Clean audio with a single speaker dubbs best. Content with heavy background music, overlapping speakers, or significant noise will produce lower quality results.

Plan Requirements and Languages

Dubbing Studio is available from the Creator plan ($22/month). The free and Starter plans do not include dubbing access. As of 2026, ElevenLabs supports dubbing across 29+ languages — check the current documentation for the full language list, as coverage continues to expand.

Try This

Find a short video (60–90 seconds) with clear speech — a clip from a presentation you gave, a screen recording, or any video where you own the rights. Upload it to Dubbing Studio and run Automatic mode into a language you speak even a little of. Listen to the output: how natural is the vocal character? How well did it handle proper nouns? Then switch to Studio mode and open the transcript — find one line where the translation feels off and edit it before regenerating just that segment.