You know videos have a global reach. But if you’re just making them in English, you’re missing out on tapping the wider reach. What’s more, over 51% of online shoppers say information in their own language matters more than price.  Video localization helps you bridge the gap between the message and the cultural context. However, manually doing so is time-consuming and expensive.
What if localization was as simple as uploading your video and picking a language? In this guide, we’ll show you how video localization works and how Trupeer helps you create localized videos at scale.

What is Video Localization in a Nutshell? 

In the simplest terms, video localization adapts your video content to people from different places who speak different languages. This means you will modify dialogues, captions, script, on-screen text, and visuals, and other cultural cues for the specific audience. 
The kind of video content worth localizing includes product demos, training videos, onboarding tutorials, and any content meant to teach, guide, or build trust with your audience.

So then, what’s the difference between translation and localization of videos?

Although both terms are used interchangeably, they’re not the same. Translation is a literal conversion of words from one language to another. Whereas in localization, you understand the nuances of tone, idioms, intent, cultural references, and even the emotional resonance of the phrases you use. Let’s understand this with an example. Say you’re making an explainer video for your fintech app. In the U.S., phrases like “smash your savings goals” are widely accepted. However, in Germany, audiences expect more direct and informative content around financial tools and a literal translation would fall flat. 

Here, video localization will involve changing the phrase to something more straightforward, updating any on-screen text, and adjusting visuals or examples so they make sense to a German audience.

What aspects of video should be localized?

If you’re new to localization, consider using the following methods to make your video speak multiple languages like a native. 

1. Voiceover 

One big reason you should consider adding a voiceover when localizing your video is that the content is much easier to absorb. A well-recorded voice-over acts like a guide, helping viewers follow along as the visuals play.
Another reason to jump on board is that you don’t just want to rely on visuals for impact. If your audience is watching while commuting or multitasking, the voiceover ensures they can still follow the message without needing to keep their eyes on the screen. For this, your voiceover must have a strong or distinct personality and emotions. 
But what happens when the audio quality is not great? It will cause your audience to tune out and lose interest or miss important information as they can’t hear clearly. 

🧠 Fun Fact: The first-ever voiceover was recorded by Reginald Fessenden in 1900. It wasn’t invented for TV or film purposes, but while testing the weather. 

📽️ Trupeer Insight: You can instantly add a localized voiceover to your video using native-speaking avatars or upload your own recording within Trupeer. The platform auto-syncs narration with visuals and captions, so you don’t have to manually match timing. This makes multilingual voiceovers faster to produce without compromising clarity or tone. 

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2. Captions and subtitles 

When you transcribe a video, captions and subtitles are two different ways to do so. 
Captions: On-screen text showing all audio content—spoken words plus non-speech elements like [music], [laughter], or [door closes]. 
Purpose: Primarily for viewers who are hard of hearing or those watching with sound off.
When to use captions in localization: Where accessibility is a must, such as product demos, training videos, or corporate communication.
Subtitles: Translate spoken dialogue into another language and presume the audience can also hear the audio. 
Purpose: Help viewers who don’t understand the video’s original language.
When to use subtitles in localization: When you want to keep original audio (e.g., brand voice, celebrity spokesperson) but make it understandable in other languages. Think marketing videos or onboarding clips.
💡 Pro Tip: Pair captions with localized voiceovers to make your videos accessible and culturally relevant, especially for training or compliance content. 

3. Dubbing and lip syncing 

If you’ve ever watched a dubbed video where the words don’t match the speaker’s lip movements, you know how distracting it is. The mismatch makes the content feel awkward and breaks viewer immersion. 
In dubbing, you replace the audio track of your original video and re-record the dialogue and sound effects to match the lip movement and actions. Lipsync goes a step further. It matches the speaker’s mouth movements to the new language to make your localized video feel seamless instead of stitched together.
Example: When you’re dubbing an English video into German, the script will be 10-30% longer. Since German often runs longer, the script may be shortened slightly without losing meaning. This keeps it in sync with the speaker’s mouth movements and scene timing. You will also have to consider lip sync alignment with small rephrasing. 
💡 Pro Tip: Don’t forget sound design. Recreate or adjust background sounds and effects to match the new timing so the dub feels integrated, not overlaid. This keeps the viewing experience natural and immersive.

Video Localization Use Cases

Let’s understand the types of videos you should consider localizing, before we get into the DIY step-by-step process. 

1. Product and explainer videos

These videos often sit at the top of the buyer journey and shape a viewer’s first impression of your product. If the language or cultural references don’t connect, potential customers will miss out on the key benefits. For example, “tax automation” in the U.S. might become “GST reconciliation” in India or “Vorsteuer” clarity in Germany.
You will also have to change the currency, dates, and units and record screenshots from the localized product, not the English user interface (UI). Do not miss out on aligning examples and disclaimers with local rules. What you can say about data residency or payments varies by geography. 

Read More: How to Create a Screenshot Recording using Trupeer 

2. Corporate communications

What happens when your employees don’t fully grasp an internal announcement or policy update due to language barriers? It would lead to confusion, non-compliance, and missed deadlines.
For example, a metaphor “quarterbacking a project” in the CEO message is inspiring for the U.S. teams but leaves German employees confused. 
Localizing communication videos involves changing word choices, pacing, and even the background visuals to make them culturally relatable. At the same time, it will keep the leadership’s original intent intact. 
Policy and compliance videos bring another challenge: legal phrasing. A term like “data breach” may require different legal terminology and examples in Europe under GDPR than in the U.S. under CCPA. Without this adjustment, you risk non-compliance.
📽️ Trupeer Insight: Some ideas are better on video. For example, a welcome message from the CEO that every new employee receives. With Trupeer, you can turn your company values into a visual story. All this, with synced voiceover, your company branding, and step-by-step guides. 

Use Trupeer to Localize your Videos

3. Customer-facing content

Over 79% of your customers expect your business to understand needs and expectations across all channels and departments. You might have the best product on the market, but if your help docs and user guides are locked in English, you’re still losing business. 
But what if we told you that you could flip the script! What if your customer in Buenos Aires felt as supported as your user in Boston? Localizing your customer-facing videos and other assets will mean fewer tickets, faster resolutions, and higher CSAT. Another way to use this would be when you’re expanding products/services to a new geography and you want to test out the market before hiring a team in that region. 
Example: HubSpot localizes its entire Academy, including video tutorials, certification courses, and product walkthroughs, into multiple languages (e.g., Spanish, French, German, Japanese).

4. Training and e-learning

Learners absorb content better in their native language. People trained in their first language retain 30–50% more information compared to second-language content. From a business lens, localizing video content has another benefit. It improves operational scanablity.  
You don’t need separate teams or training materials for every language. Create a module in one language and localize it for the rest of the regions. In compliance-intensive industries such as healthcare, banking, and manufacturing, that rely on repeatable training systems, this serves as a great option.  
Case in point: Manual training was creating roadblocks in scaling LambdaTest’s sales team enablement. In the words of Navya Manoj, the Senior Product Manager, Trupeer helped them:
“Trupeer AI has been a game-changer for our training process. It allowed us to create professional, concise videos and documentation that resonate with our global team. The automation and inclusivity features have saved us countless hours, making onboarding seamless and effective.”

📽️ Trupeer Insight: If you already have a training module, using Trupeer, you can adapt it into multiple languages with native-accent voiceovers, region-specific captions, and synced visuals. Latin American ERP provider Siigo used Trupeer’s AI platform to localize its educational content in 50+ languages. They achieved 30% faster production with premium quality.

👀 Did You Know? Salesforce has rolled out AI tools like Career Connect and Career Agent to support internal career growth and training. Integrated with Slack, these tools analyze employee profiles to recommend tailored training and career paths. In one pilot, 74% of users engaged with the tool and nearly 40% enrolled in recommended courses.

What are the Benefits of Video Localization? 

More than just a checkbox, video localization offers long-term benefits that extend across your organization. 

1. Faster onboarding and ramp-up: When your how-to videos, employee onboarding tutorials, or internal SOPs are localized, new users or hires don’t waste energy translating concepts in their head. They get it the first time and result in shorter ramp-up time.
2. Lower support volume and higher CSAT: By localizing troubleshooting guides, product FAQs, or step-by-step walkthroughs, you equip users to solve problems themselves, in their language and on their timeline. 
3. Increased trust and brand affinity: People don’t just buy products, they buy into brands that see them. A localized video says, “we made this for you,” even if it was originally produced elsewhere. 
4. Better performance in high-intent moments: When you're launching a new feature, closing a deal, or delivering compliance training, the stakes are high. Localized videos ensure that viewers across regions have the same level of understanding. Nuance shouldn’t get lost in translation when it matters most.

Read More: Best SOP Creation Software to Streamline your Processes 

Steps involved in Video Localization 

If you’ve made it so far, you know why localization of videos matters. But at the end of the day, you want to do it fast. Here’s how you can do so, at scale, using Trupeer, the best video localization software. 

Step #1: Record or upload your video 

The best part about Trupeer is that you don’t need any technical setup or equipment. Nor do you have to worry about different file formats. 
If you already have a video, you can just upload it to Trupeer’s Translation Platform. It supports standard formats and files up to 5 minutes (or 150MB). When you upload, select the original language so Trupeer’s AI knows what to work with. 

If you don’t have a video yet, you can use Trupeer’s Chrome extension to record your screen and talk through your steps. Don’t worry about the technical settings. Hit the record button, do your thing, and let Trupeer handle the rest. 

👀 Did You Know? Before AI tools simplified video editing, editors often had to work with footage in multiple file types (like AVI, MOV, MP4) and codecs (such as ProRes or H.264). Different editing systems handled these formats in different ways, which made combining clips into a single project slow and error-prone.

Step #2: Let AI transcribe and analyze 

Once your video is uploaded or recorded, let Trupeer uses AI to transcribe and analyze your video. 

Behind the scenes, Trupeer will: 

• Transcribe your narration and remove all the ‘umms’ and ‘uhhs’ 

• Break down your video into clear steps, detect visuals and slide changes, and clean up grammar 

When you’re trimming the recording using Trupeer, AI automatically detects and removes filler words. This saves you the editing time. Also, since the intuitive timeline is like a doc, you don’t need to worry about keyframes or shortcuts. 
👀 Did You Know? Researchers behind wav2vec 2.0 demonstrated that self-supervised learning from just ten minutes of labelled speech combined with over 53,000 hours of unlabeled audio. They achieved impressively accurate transcription: just 4.8% WER (Word Error Rate) on clean speech.

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Step #3: Localize your video 

Trupeer offers built-in features to localize your video. Here’s what you can do: 

• Translate your content into 30+ languages

• Voiceover with AI voice cloning that sounds natural and human 

• Use the AI avatar generator powered by Heygen for a talking-head style video in the new language 

• Translate on-screen text and labels, and adapt visuals if needed 

Once your video is transcribed and localized, you can fine-tune it further with Trupeer’s AI video editor. Tweak the voiceovers or narration if something sounds off, adjust the tone, or replace it with a different AI voice. 

To personalize it even more, with Trupeer’s Brand Kit, you can upload your logos, brand colors, and custom intros/outro slides. You don’t need to start from scratch every time. Trupeer’s templates store this information for you. You can even add subtitles and background music to make the video more inclusive. 
📽️ Trupeer Insight: Once your video is translated to another language, Trupeer automatically syncs the video as per the pace and structure of the new language. 
As Shubham Sadavat from Zetwerk says, “Knowledge transfer across hundreds of tools is a hassle. Trupeer helps us fix that at scale—with rich videos and guides that live forever.” 
The result? Training and process knowledge stay clear, consistent, and accessible across every region you operate in.

Step #4: Export your content 

Once everything looks polished, hit Generate. In a few minutes, Trupeer delivers your localized video. Upon clicking Export, you can get it as an MP4, share it via a shareable link, or export the full guide or transcript as a PDF or Word document. The video editing software helps you generate localized product walk-through videos, user guides, and more. 

Step #5: Convert it into how-to guides 

Trupeer allows you to convert your video into a how-to guide. You get all the steps listed in the video. 

You can also translate this document into the language you want and choose from the available languages. 

Achieve Your Video Localization Goals With Trupeer 

You don’t need a massive production budget or a localization team to reach a global audience. You can do so at 1/10th of the cost and in minutes, using Trupeer. With Trupeer, record, localize, and edit your video in one place. 
Trupeer is built for non-technical folks who don’t want the hassle of learning complex editing software just to get a simple video out.
P.S. Consider this a sign to get started with video localization if you’ve been holding it off.  

Create your First Localized Video using Trupeer for Free 

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) 

1. What types of videos are best suited for localization?

Training tutorials, product demos, marketing videos, onboarding walkthroughs, support videos, and marketing assets are strong candidates for video localization. Start with content that directly impacts customer experience or sales in your target regions.

2. How do I decide which videos to localize first?

Prioritize based on reach, ROI potential, and usage frequency. If a video drives onboarding, closes deals, or reduces support tickets, that will be your first candidate for video localization. 

3. How can I create localized videos by myself? 

Start by signing up on Trupeer, the best tool for video localization and translation. You can automate transcription, translation, dubbing, voiceovers, subtitle generation, and even create how-to guides listing the steps of the video. That said, you cannot undermine the importance of human overview for quality control, tonality changes, and cultural nuance. 

4. How do I measure the ROI of video localization?

Track metrics like localized video views, engagement rates, customer satisfaction scores, conversion rates by region, and support ticket reduction. Compare these gains to localization costs to gauge effectiveness.

5. Can Trupeer help me with both video localization and documentation? 

Yes. You can record your video with Trupeer and then localize it into your language of choice. Trupeer also generates a step-by-step written guide alongside. This means you can same content in both video and document form. As a result, you can use Trupeer to create online courses, help center documents, onboarding documents, and internal wikis.