The short answer. First, check whether the video already has a YouTube dub in your language: open the player’s settings and look under Audio track. If it’s there, use it. It’s free, it’s a natural voice, and there is no delay. If it isn’t there, and most of the time it isn’t, DubMog dubs the video as it plays: any video, any channel, live streams included, into 38 languages for free in Chrome and 80+ with Pro Live, with a transcript you can keep. Here is what YouTube’s own dubbing covers, what it doesn’t, and how to set DubMog up in a minute.
YouTube’s own auto-dubbing, honestly
YouTube generates dubbed audio tracks for eligible channels automatically when a video is uploaded. The dub is made once, in advance, and shows up as an extra audio track; the player picks a track for you from your language settings, and you can switch back to the original. YouTube’s help page on automatic dubbing lists about 30 languages in its dubbing table, and from an English video it dubs into 20 of them. In eight of those languages, English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, German, Italian, Hindi and Indonesian, the voice can carry the speaker’s pitch and intonation.
What it does not cover, from that same help page:
- Only some videos. The channel has to be eligible and have the feature on, and dubs for older videos arrive over time, if at all.
- Not every direction. From an English video, YouTube dubs into 20 languages. From most other languages, it dubs into English only. A Vietnamese or Turkish viewer watching an English video, or a Spanish viewer watching a Japanese one, usually gets nothing.
- No live streams. Dubs are generated when a video is uploaded, so a stream, a premiere or a live Q&A has none while it is live.
- Skipped videos. Videos over 120 minutes, with little or no speech, with speech that’s too fast, with copyrighted content, or whose language YouTube can’t detect or doesn’t support get no dub.
- Quality varies, and the creator can’t edit a dub, only regenerate it.
So the honest rule: when YouTube’s dub exists for your language, take it. The rest of this guide is for everything else.
What DubMog does on YouTube
DubMog is an extension for Chrome and Microsoft Edge that listens to the tab you’re watching and speaks it in your language while the video plays, a few seconds behind, with a running transcript in the side panel. On YouTube that means:
- Any video, any channel, any age. It works from the audio, so it doesn’t matter whether the creator turned anything on.
- Live streams, premieres and long videos. DubMog has no per-video limit; a three-hour stream works like a short clip.
- Your language, from any language. Free Standard mode listens to 23 video languages and dubs into 38 in Chrome (70+ in Edge’s free mode). Pro Live covers 80+ languages with a natural AI voice.
- The transcript. Every translated line is kept with its time under “Translation”; “Copy all” or “Download .txt” keeps it. It stays on your computer and is cleared when you close the browser.
- Keeps going. Autoplay, playlists, the next video in the queue: DubMog dubs the tab you started it on, even while you browse in other tabs.
What it isn’t: it isn’t YouTube’s voice. In Standard mode you hear your browser’s own voice, basic but free; in Pro Live a natural one. The dub starts about 3 to 4.5 seconds after the speaker, so the original is turned down underneath while the translation speaks. And it’s one voice for everyone on screen.
Set it up on YouTube
- Add DubMog from the Chrome Web Store, or from Microsoft Edge Add-ons if you use Edge. Free.
- Open the video and press play.
- Open DubMog on that tab. Click the DubMog icon in the toolbar, press Alt+Shift+D, or right-click the page and choose “Dub this video with DubMog”. The browser only lets an extension hear a tab after that one click.
- Pick your language under “Dub into”, choose Standard (free, on this device) or Live (faster, real voice), and press “Start dubbing”. The first time, the dub language follows your browser’s language.
Prefer an app? On Windows 11, DubMog for Windows dubs everything your PC plays, including YouTube in any browser or window. The Windows guide →
Standard or Pro Live for YouTube?
Start with Standard. It’s free: 30 minutes a day without an account, unlimited with a free one. Switch to Pro Live for the natural voice, for a language Standard can’t dub into on your computer, or when the speaker is fast and you want the quicker engine. Pro Live uses DubMog minutes: Pro is $9.99 a month (about 300 minutes of Pro Live at the member rate) or $79.99 a year; packs are $1.99 for 60 minutes (about 20 minutes of Live) and $4.99 for 180 (about 60), and never expire. A free taste of Live is one click away a few times a day. What the free mode includes, with the 38 languages → · How many minutes do I need? →
Tips that make YouTube sound better
- Headphones. You hear the dub clearly over the turned-down original.
- Talk, not music. DubMog translates speech. On a music video the panel says, in words like these, “No speech came through to translate. Try a video where someone is talking.”
- Fast talkers lag more. The dub can’t speak faster than the speaker. If a channel talks at double speed, Pro Live keeps up better than Standard, and a short pause lets the dub catch up.
- Shorts eat Live minutes. Live counts in 60-second blocks while audio plays, so a feed of 20-second Shorts is the worst use of Pro Live. Use Standard for Shorts, or Live for the long videos.
- Check a word. The transcript panel keeps every line; glance back instead of rewinding.
YouTube’s dub or DubMog? The honest comparison
| YouTube’s auto-dubbing | DubMog Standard | DubMog Pro Live | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Who switches it on | The channel | You | You |
| When the dub is made | Before you watch, at upload | While you watch | While you watch |
| Live streams | No | Yes | Yes |
| Which videos | Eligible channels, under 120 minutes, clear speech | Any video with speech | Any video with speech |
| Languages | About 30 in its table; from English into 20, from most others into English only | 38 dub languages in Chrome, 70+ in Edge, from 23 video languages | 80+ |
| Voice | Natural; expressive in 8 languages | Your browser’s voice | Natural AI voice |
| Delay | None | About 4 seconds | About 3 seconds |
| Transcript | Captions, if the video has them | Live, yours to keep | Live, yours to keep |
| Price | Free | Free | DubMog minutes |
| Works outside YouTube | No | Any site with sound | Any site with sound |
How fast is real-time dubbing, measured → · What about Netflix, Crunchyroll and DRM? →
Quick answers
Is DubMog free on YouTube?
Yes. The extension is free to install and Standard mode is free: 30 minutes a day without an account, unlimited with a free account. Pro Live uses DubMog minutes.
Does it work on YouTube live streams?
Yes. DubMog dubs what the tab plays, as it plays, so a live stream works like any video. YouTube’s own automatic dubbing is generated when a video is uploaded, so a stream has none while it is live.
Can it dub YouTube Music or music videos?
No. It translates speech, not singing.
Does it work in the YouTube app on my phone?
The extension is for Chrome and Edge on a computer. On a phone, the DubMog app dubs videos you own and, on iPhone, the audio other apps play; whether a given app’s audio reaches it depends on that app.
Does the creator or YouTube know I’m dubbing?
No. DubMog runs in your browser and the transcript stays on your computer. Audio is processed in the moment via Google’s Gemini API and is not stored.
Is YouTube’s dub better than DubMog’s?
When it exists in your language, usually yes: a natural voice with no delay. Use it. DubMog is for the videos, streams and languages YouTube’s dubbing doesn’t reach, which is most of them.
Which is faster, Standard or Live?
Pro Live starts speaking about 3.3 seconds after the speaker on average; Standard about 4 seconds per phrase.
Get DubMog
Free for Chrome and Microsoft Edge. The next video you open is the test.