Microsoft Teams live translation: how each option works

Live translation in Teams works in four ways: translated captions, the Interpreter agent, human language interpretation and an external translator bot. The first three are built in, but tied to licences and to the type of attendee; the bot is the only one that asks nothing of your Microsoft tenant except permission to enter. Pick based on what your listeners need (reading, hearing or both) and who they are (colleagues, guests, shift workers).

The four options side by side

The table was checked against Microsoft's documentation on 7 October 2026. Microsoft changes licences and language lists often, so confirm in the linked sources before you decide.

Two limits tend to surprise people. First, Microsoft says recordings of meetings that use the Interpreter agent or language interpretation contain only the original audio, so the translation is gone when the call ends. Second, the Interpreter agent includes 20 hours of interpretation per month per user with a Copilot licence; beyond that, use depends on available capacity.

Which option fits which meeting

• Everyone is a colleague, the organizer has Premium or Copilot, and reading is enough: translated captions. Nothing to install.
• Colleagues with Copilot licences who would rather listen than read: the Interpreter agent. Check that no key person joins as a guest.
• A board meeting or a negotiation where an accountable person must interpret: language interpretation. Microsoft does not supply the interpreters, so budget for hiring them.
• Guests, customers, shift workers or a team without Copilot: a translator bot with a listener link. That is the case in the next section.

Teams translation without Copilot

Without Copilot you still have two Microsoft options: translated captions, if the organizer has Premium, and human interpreters. To offer spoken translation to people outside your licence group, you add a bot that joins as one more participant, such as Akume. Akume translates each speaker, shows captions in the call and gives everyone a listener link to hear and read the call in their own language. According to Akume's product information, one listener link supports up to 500 connections, needs no account or install, and no recording is kept after the call.

How to add a translator bot to a Teams meeting

1. Check the meeting policy. In the Teams admin center, under Meetings > Meeting policies, the organizer's policy must let anonymous users join. Changes can take up to 24 hours to apply.
2. Check the meeting options. Open the meeting options and make sure "Require unverified participants to verify their info before joining" is off. A bot cannot receive an email code.
3. Check external access. If the organizer and the guest belong to different tenants, both sides' external access policies must trust the other's domain; otherwise guests are treated as anonymous.
4. Copy the meeting link from the invitation and paste it into the bot service. With Akume you paste the link and the translator joins as a participant.
5. Admit the bot. It shows up as an unverified participant and waits in the lobby unless the lobby settings let it through. The organizer or a presenter selects Admit.
6. Choose the languages for the session and share the listener link with anyone who wants spoken translation in their language. Captions also appear in the call.
7. Tell the room. Say out loud that a translation bot is present, especially in compliance or HR meetings.

If the bot never appears in the lobby, a policy is most likely blocking anonymous entry. If it appears but cannot get in after admission, check the email-code requirement. If listeners hear nothing, they most likely opened the Teams link instead of the listener link.

Notes for IT, data protection and compliance

Treat the translator bot like any other third party that hears the meeting audio. These are the questions worth settling before the first real session:

1. IT approval. Does your security team accept the vendor's certifications (for example ISO 27001) and hosting region?
2. Data processing. Sign a data processing agreement, ask for the list of sub-processors, and ask what is stored (audio, captions or both) and for how long.
3. Worker representation. In many companies the works council or union representatives must be consulted before technical systems that can record what staff say are introduced. This is a particular point in DACH countries, where the Betriebsrat often has a co-determination right. Captions are text of what each person said, so describe them clearly in the agreement. Settle the rules before the rollout, not after the first complaint.
4. Transparency. At the start of the meeting, tell participants that a translator is present and what it keeps.
5. Built-in features raise the same questions. The Interpreter agent runs on Azure speech services and processes meeting audio in the Microsoft cloud; Microsoft says voice samples are not stored. Your legal team will still want that in writing.

What to read next

Teams is one of three platforms. For the other two, see live translation in Zoom and translation in Google Meet. If you are comparing tools rather than platforms, start with translators for video calls, real-time voice translators and the best translators for calls.

Try it before asking IT for licences

Licence requests and policy changes take weeks; hearing a translated conversation takes a minute. Try the free live demo first, decide whether spoken translation is what your meetings need, and only then raise the Microsoft licence question with IT.