Speaker (German)
Willkommen an unserem Stand. Darf ich Ihnen unsere neue Fertigungslinie zeigen?
ようこそ私どものブースへ。新しい製造ラインをご案内してもよろしいでしょうか？
Hallo こんにちは
Live translation
German ↔ Japanese
through one pair of earbuds.
Share an earbud. Pick German and Japanese. Each of you hears the other in your own language, live.
A sample exchange
Three turns between German and Japanese, the way they'd actually go. Each card shows the original line above the translation.
Speaker (Japanese)
ぜひお願いします。特にタクトタイムに関心があります。
Sehr gerne. Uns interessiert vor allem die Taktzeit.
Speaker (German)
Natürlich. Die Vorführung beginnt in fünf Minuten, kommen Sie einfach mit.
もちろんです。実演は5分後に始まりますので、どうぞこちらへ。
What metcha supports for this pair
| German | 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
Germany and Japan have deep engineering and business ties: automotive suppliers, machine-tool makers, and trade fairs bring the two languages together constantly, and Düsseldorf hosts one of the largest Japanese communities in Europe. Both cultures take formality seriously, and German Sie maps naturally onto Japanese です／ます, a register that metcha's Better Translation path on metcha Plus keeps consistent through a conversation. Most tools pivot this pair through English; metcha Plus translates between German and Japanese directly with conversational context.
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
-
German: Guten Tag, freut mich.
Japanese: こんにちは、はじめまして。
- Thank you
-
German: Vielen Dank.
Japanese: ありがとうございます。
- Apology
-
German: Entschuldigung, das habe ich nicht verstanden.
Japanese: すみません、わかりませんでした。
- Directions
-
German: Wie komme ich zum Hauptbahnhof?
Japanese: 中央駅へはどう行けばいいですか？
- Ordering
-
German: Was empfehlen Sie?
Japanese: おすすめは何ですか？
- Allergy
-
German: Ich bin allergisch gegen Nüsse.
Japanese: ナッツアレルギーがあります。
- Bill
-
German: Die Rechnung, bitte.
Japanese: お会計をお願いします。
- Hotel
-
German: Ich habe eine Reservierung auf den Namen [Name].
Japanese: [名前]で予約しています。
- Meeting
-
German: Könnten wir den Termin auf morgen verschieben?
Japanese: 打ち合わせを明日に変更できますか？
- Help
-
German: Können Sie mir bitte helfen?
Japanese: 助けていただけますか？
Where you'd use it
- Trade fairs and industry conferences in Germany and Japan For conferences →
- Factory visits and engineering reviews in automotive and manufacturing
- Japanese expat teams in Düsseldorf, home to one of Europe's largest Japanese communities
- German business travelers in Tokyo See the Tokyo guide →
Common questions
- Does metcha translate Japanese to German as well as German to Japanese?
- Yes, both directions run in the same session. When someone speaks German, the other person hears it in Japanese; when they reply in Japanese, you hear it in German. There is no direction to configure and no turn-taking button. See how it works for the full walkthrough.
- Is German ↔ 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 German 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 German 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.