Speaker (French)
Bonjour, qu'est-ce qui vous ferait plaisir aujourd'hui ?
こんにちは、本日は何になさいますか？
Bonjour こんにちは
Live translation
French ↔ Japanese
through one pair of earbuds.
Share an earbud. Pick French and Japanese. Each of you hears the other in your own language, live.
A sample exchange
Three turns between French and Japanese, the way they'd actually go. Each card shows the original line above the translation.
Speaker (Japanese)
ミルフィーユを一つとマカロンを二つお願いします。
Je vais prendre un millefeuille et deux macarons, s'il vous plaît.
Speaker (French)
Très bien. Je vous prépare un petit paquet pour la route ?
かしこまりました。お持ち帰り用にお包みしましょうか？
What metcha supports for this pair
| French | Japanese | |
|---|---|---|
| Apple on-device translation | ✓ | ✓ |
| Deepgram cloud STT | ✓ | ✓ |
| iOS built-in voices | ✓ | ✓ |
| ElevenLabs premium voices (Plus) | 4 voices | 4 voices |
| Voice cloning (Plus, your voice) | ✓ | ✓ |
Why metcha for this pair
France and Japan share one of the great tourism relationships: Japanese visitors have been a fixture in Paris for decades, and French travelers fill Kyoto's temples and Tokyo's restaurants in return. Structurally the languages could hardly be further apart, French verb-medial in the Latin alphabet, Japanese verb-final in kanji and kana. Most translation tools route non-English pairs through English; metcha's Better Translation path on metcha Plus translates directly between French and Japanese with conversational context, matching the vous register to the right Japanese politeness level (です／ます).
Common phrases
Hand-picked phrases for everyday Japanese-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
-
French: Bonjour, enchanté.
Japanese: こんにちは、はじめまして。
- Thank you
-
French: Merci beaucoup.
Japanese: ありがとうございます。
- Apology
-
French: Désolé, je ne comprends pas.
Japanese: すみません、わかりません。
- Directions
-
French: Où est la station de métro la plus proche ?
Japanese: 一番近い地下鉄の駅はどこですか？
- Ordering
-
French: Qu'est-ce que vous recommandez ?
Japanese: おすすめは何ですか？
- Allergy
-
French: Je suis allergique aux fruits à coque.
Japanese: ナッツアレルギーがあります。
- Bill
-
French: L'addition, s'il vous plaît.
Japanese: お会計をお願いします。
- Hotel
-
French: J'ai une réservation au nom de [nom].
Japanese: [名前]で予約しています。
- Pharmacy
-
French: Avez-vous quelque chose contre le mal de tête ?
Japanese: 頭痛の薬はありますか？
- Taxi
-
French: À cette adresse, s'il vous plaît.
Japanese: この住所までお願いします。
Where you'd use it
- Japanese visitors in Paris: patisseries, boutiques, museums See the Paris guide →
- French travelers in Tokyo and Kyoto See the Kyoto guide →
- Food, fashion, and design exchanges between the two countries
- Hospitality teams in Paris welcoming Japanese guests
Common questions
- Does metcha translate Japanese to French as well as French to Japanese?
- Yes, both directions run in the same session. When someone speaks French, the other person hears it in Japanese; when they reply in Japanese, you hear it in French. There is no direction to configure and no turn-taking button. See how it works for the full walkthrough.
- Is French ↔ Japanese translation in metcha on-device or cloud?
- Both. metcha's free tier uses Apple's on-device Translation framework where supported (available for both French and Japanese). 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 French and Japanese?
- 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 Japanese?
- metcha's Deepgram STT path handles major regional variants of Japanese 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 Japanese?
- 4 curated native-Japanese 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.