The beta program for T-Mobile’s Live Translation feature is now open, allowing customers signed up for the test phase to speak with people in more than 50 languages, with AI translating the conversation in real time. No human translator in the middle, no specific phone model required (yes, even a basic dumb phone will work).
Real-time translation is already available through services like Google Translate on Android phones and Apple AirPods Pro 3 when paired with an iPhone.
What makes T-Mobile’s Live Translation feature unique is that it works at the network level rather than at a specific device. The beta is open to subscribers of any T-Mobile postpaid plan, such as Essentials, More Experience, Experience Beyond and Better Value plans. Customers who have already signed up for the beta will start receiving notifications that the feature is continuously available.
“We want to make the voice cool again,” said John Saw, T-Mobile’s chief technology officer, pointing out that its customers make 6 billion international calls a year, and 40% of those people travel internationally. “Live Translation is a real breakthrough in innovation by introducing the latest AI models to our voice network.”
As happened during the beta period of what became T-Satellite service, T-Mobile has not decided which plans will include the live translation calling feature. It has not yet decided how much, if any, it will cost. Satellite is currently included in the Experience Beyond and Better Value plans and is available in other plans as a $10 add-on. It is also open to customers of other providers for $10 per month.
I look forward to checking out T-Mobile’s live translation soon.
How will live translation work
You must dial *87* to activate T-Mobile’s live translation call tool.
To turn on live translation during a call, a T-Mobile subscriber presses *87* (star-eight-seven star), which activates the AI agent. Only one person participating in the call needs to be a T-Mobile subscriber, and it will work when the customer is roaming.
IT-Mobile says there is no setup, no voice training and no need to specify which languages to translate. The AI agent detects which languages are being spoken in real time and speaks a translation when the person stops speaking.
The AI agent will also detect that you are calling from another country and select the translation language. If you call someone in Brazil, they may choose Portuguese, for example. If the person speaks a different language, such as Spanish instead of Brazilian Portuguese, the agent will change immediately.
Also, the spoken translation will not sound like a robot voice. “Our AI model can actually simulate your voice in another language and preserve pitch, emotion and rhythm,” Saw said. He says the performance is consistent with the low latency found on T-Mobile’s 5G Advanced network.
Once activated, the feature does not need to be disabled. If both speakers switch to the same language, the AI agent simply stops working as a mediator.
The true test will be the quality of the translations. “We’ve done a lot of AI-powered translation measurements,” Saw said, “and it’s on par with the accuracy of all established services.” He said the model complies with FCC 2027 captioning guidelines and meets all ADA accessibility standards.
When I asked Saw if conversations were being recorded, even during beta, he said that this type of maintenance is done using millions of internal test calls only. “We don’t listen to customer calls, either [the AI models] are not trained on customer data,” Saw said, noting that the service meets all FCC privacy guidelines.
Exactly which AI translation models are being used, or which partner companies are providing them, is something Saw declined to share. He confirmed that T-Mobile is working with several AI companies, but “we won’t name them because we love them all the same.”
Saw noted that the way T-Mobile’s network is designed as a platform has the advantage of being able to connect updated AI translation models, launch development overnight and make it available on hundreds of millions of phones.
Live translation is just T-Mobile’s first AI feature
All the major mobile providers are using AI to varying degrees. AT&T recently announced AI technology to optimize Internet traffic at the home router level, for example, and Verizon is deploying Google’s AI to improve its customer service experience. IT-Mobile itself uses AI to automatically redirect cell load between towers during emergencies.
Besides pointing to some future strategies, Saw named a few other jobs that AI agents could handle in the future, such as an AI receptionist or AI concierge. Centralizing AI technology in the network opens up those possibilities.
So why is the company choosing live translation as the first installation of AI, customer-facing network features?
“Live translation is not an easy solution,” Saw replied, “but it’s a real pain point to solve today.”
