Speaker (English)
Hi — I'd like a coffee and a croissant, please.
Bonjour, je voudrais un café et un croissant, s'il vous plaît.
Hello Bonjour
Live translation
English ↔ French
through one pair of earbuds.
Share an earbud. Pick English and French. Each of you hears the other in your own language, live.
A sample exchange
Three turns between English and French, the way they'd actually go. Each card shows the original line above the translation.
Speaker (French)
Bien sûr. Sur place ou à emporter ?
Of course. For here or to take away?
Speaker (English)
For here, please.
Sur place, s'il vous plaît.
What metcha supports for this pair
| English | French | |
|---|---|---|
| Apple on-device translation | ✓ | ✓ |
| Deepgram cloud STT | ✓ | ✓ |
| iOS built-in voices | ✓ | ✓ |
| ElevenLabs premium voices (Plus) | 6 voices | 4 voices |
| Voice cloning (Plus, your voice) | ✓ | ✓ |
Why metcha for this pair
English ↔ French is well-covered end-to-end: Apple's on-device framework, Deepgram STT, and ElevenLabs voices all ship robust French support. metcha lets you choose between Parisian (fr-FR) and Quebec (fr-CA) speech voices on metcha Plus, so the cadence matches where you actually are.
Common phrases
Hand-picked phrases for everyday French-speaking situations. In metcha you don't need to memorize these — but they're useful to anchor what the app sounds like before you try it.
- Greeting
-
English: Hello, good morning.
French: Bonjour.
- Thank you
-
English: Thank you so much.
French: Merci beaucoup.
- Apology
-
English: Sorry, I don't speak French.
French: Désolé, je ne parle pas français.
- Café
-
English: Could I have a coffee, please?
French: Un café, s'il vous plaît.
- Directions
-
English: Where is the museum?
French: Où se trouve le musée ?
- Restaurant
-
English: What do you recommend?
French: Qu'est-ce que vous recommandez ?
- Bill
-
English: The bill, please.
French: L'addition, s'il vous plaît.
- Taxi
-
English: To the airport, please.
French: À l'aéroport, s'il vous plaît.
- Hotel
-
English: I'd like to check in.
French: Je voudrais faire l'enregistrement.
- Help
-
English: Could you help me, please?
French: Pouvez-vous m'aider, s'il vous plaît ?
Where you'd use it
- Travel in France — Paris, Lyon, Marseille See the Paris guide →
- Visiting Montréal or Québec City
- Business meetings with French or Canadian-French teams
- Cafés and bistros greeting English-speaking guests For cafés →
Common questions
- Does metcha translate French to English as well as English to French?
- Yes, both directions run in the same session. When someone speaks English, the other person hears it in French; when they reply in French, you hear it in English. There is no direction to configure and no turn-taking button. See how it works for the full walkthrough.
- Is English ↔ French translation in metcha on-device or cloud?
- Both. metcha's free tier uses Apple's on-device Translation framework where supported (available for both English and French). metcha Plus optionally routes through a Better Translation cloud path for more natural phrasing, with a quiet fallback to the on-device path when the network is slow.
- Do I need both AirPods to use metcha for English and French?
- No. The simplest mode is one earbud each — you keep one, the other person keeps the other. metcha handles both directions through that single shared pair. If you'd rather both wear your own earbuds, you can pair a second phone in seconds via a QR code (still no app install for the other person).
- What about regional accents within French?
- metcha's Deepgram STT path handles major regional variants of French robustly. The on-device path is more sensitive to accent — if you find the free path missing words, switching to the metcha Plus cloud STT usually fixes it without changing anything else about the conversation.
- Does it work without internet?
- The free on-device path works fully offline once the relevant Apple Translation language packs are downloaded. metcha Plus features that depend on Deepgram, Better Translation, or ElevenLabs voices need a network connection.
- How many voices does metcha ship for French?
- 4 curated native-French voices on metcha Plus, plus all iOS built-in voices on the free tier (and any Enhanced or Premium voices you've installed in Settings → Accessibility → Spoken Content).
- Are conversations private?
- metcha does not store conversations on our servers, and none of our providers retain audio for training. The free on-device path never sends audio off your phone at all. See the privacy policy for the full data-handling story.