---
title: "Supported languages"
section: "Live translation"
order: 3
sidebarLabel: "Supported languages"
---

The real-time API accepts ISO-639-1 language codes (`en`, `es`, `zh`, …).
Regional tags are accepted (`en-US`, `pt-BR`) — only the primary subtag
is used.

If you do not know which language will be spoken, pass
`sourceLanguage=auto` with `modelName=relay-2`. Each utterance is
recognised in the language it is spoken in and translated from there;
`detected_language` on every transcript frame tells you which. Add
`languageHints=en,de,fr` to narrow detection to the languages you expect.
See [Detecting the source language](/docs/api-reference#detecting-the-source-language).

To handle a conversation in two languages, pass both as
`sourceLanguage` and `targetLanguage` with `twoWay=true`; Pinch detects
which one each utterance is in and translates into the other. See
[Two-way sessions](/docs/api-reference#two-way-sessions).

---

## Languages

Every code below is supported as both `sourceLanguage` (input speech)
and `targetLanguage` (output text). The **Voice output** column marks
which languages also have a synthesized voice — use these with
`audioOutputEnabled=true`. Languages without a voice are text-only and
must be requested with `audioOutputEnabled=false`.

| Code | Language | Voice output |
| --- | --- | --- |
| `ar` | Arabic | ✓ |
| `cs` | Czech | ✓ |
| `da` | Danish | ✓ |
| `de` | German | ✓ |
| `el` | Greek | ✓ |
| `en` | English | ✓ |
| `es` | Spanish | ✓ |
| `fa` | Persian (Farsi) | ✓ |
| `fi` | Finnish | ✓ |
| `fil` | Filipino | — |
| `fr` | French | ✓ |
| `hi` | Hindi | ✓ |
| `hu` | Hungarian | ✓ |
| `id` | Indonesian | ✓ |
| `it` | Italian | ✓ |
| `ja` | Japanese | ✓ |
| `ko` | Korean | ✓ |
| `mk` | Macedonian | ✓ |
| `ms` | Malay | ✓ |
| `nl` | Dutch | ✓ |
| `pl` | Polish | ✓ |
| `pt` | Portuguese | ✓ |
| `ro` | Romanian | ✓ |
| `ru` | Russian | ✓ |
| `sv` | Swedish | ✓ |
| `th` | Thai | ✓ |
| `tr` | Turkish | ✓ |
| `vi` | Vietnamese | ✓ |
| `yue` | Cantonese | — |
| `zh` | Chinese (Mandarin) | ✓ |

## Voices

Voice-output languages are served by a library of **70 voices — 30 female and
40 male**. Each voice has a name and a numeric ID; pass the ID as the
`voiceId` session parameter.

**Every voice speaks every voice-output language above.** A voice is not tied
to a language: pin one to a speaker and it keeps the same identity when
`targetLanguage` changes, so the same person sounds like the same person in
English, Spanish, or Japanese. This makes `voiceId` the right way to give each
of your users, agents, or presenters a consistent voice.

List the catalog at any time:

```bash
curl https://ws.startpinch.com/v1/voices
```

```json
{
  "voices": [
    { "id": 1, "name": "Petra", "gender": "female" },
    { "id": 2, "name": "Ulysses", "gender": "male" }
  ]
}
```

Filter with `?gender=female` or `?gender=male`.

If you omit `voiceId`, `voiceType` (`male` or `female`) selects a default
voice for that gender. Clients that already send only `voiceType` keep
working unchanged.

With `modelName=relay-2`, `voiceId=auto` gives each speaker
the library voice that sounds most like them. See
[`voiceId=auto`](/docs/api-reference#voiceidauto--one-voice-per-speaker).

Requesting an unsupported `targetLanguage` with `audioOutputEnabled=true`
returns an `error` frame. Pass `audioOutputEnabled=false` to get
transcripts in any of the languages above.