For years, human interpreters have been considered the gold standard for multilingual communication. New research from Wordly suggests the standard is changing with the release of the 2026 State of AI Translation and Captions Report.

The 2026 State of AI Translation and Captions report, conducted independently by Dimensional Research and commissioned by Wordly, finds that two-thirds (66%) of enterprise event planners now say AI translation and captions deliver better quality than human interpreters. That shift strengthens with AI usage. Among regular users, 79% say AI performs better, while just 12% prefer human interpreters.

“Much of the public conversation around AI still focuses on risk, uncertainty, and what the technology cannot do,” said Lakshman Rathnam, Wordly Founder & CEO. “But research shows that organizations that use AI translation are making decisions based on outcomes, not assumptions. They’re seeing measurable gains in quality, accessibility, and scale and that is reshaping what they expect from language technology.”

This is Wordly’s fourth annual study of multilingual meetings and events. The series began in 2022, six months before ChatGPT launched, when live AI translation was new to almost everyone. It expanded to live captioning in 2024, focused on the public sector in 2025, and this year focuses on the needs within businesses, covering both larger external conferences and the smaller everyday meetings across marketing, sales, HR, and learning and development.

For years, organizations treated live AI translation and captioning as a promising but uncertain bet, and multilingual audiences paid the price, left to rely on a bilingual colleague, a last-minute interpreter, or the assumption that English was probably fine. What changed is not just the technology but the consensus around it. This year’s data captures that shift in detail, from how many languages are now in the room to how buyers decide what to use.

Key Findings from the 2026 State of AI Translation and Captions Survey:

• A New Quality Standard: 66% of enterprise event planners report that AI translation and captioning delivers higher quality than human interpreters (compared to 25% who still prefer traditional interpretation services).
• High Satisfaction Across the Board: 79% of regular users say AI translation performs better than traditional options (with just 12% preferring human interpreters), while 61% of occasional users report a superior experience.
• Rapid Technology Advances: 93% of respondents state that AI translation quality has noticeably improved over the past year.
• Economics Driving Adoption: 95% of enterprise organizations find AI translation more affordable and easier to deploy than human interpretation, allowing them to expand language access within budget constraints.
• Surging Multilingual Demand: 88% of respondents report an increase in non-English-speaking participants, up from 77% the previous year.
• A Universal Corporate Priority: 96% of surveyed organizations state that providing comprehensive language access is now an official priority.

What’s Next: The Future Strategy for Enterprise Language Access

Despite near-universal adoption of AI interpretation (88%) and captioning (91%), 97% of respondents want capabilities beyond live translation, including:

• 58% are interested in adding full multilingual transcripts
• 53% would like to add subtitle and voice dubbing files
• 51% are interested in creating meeting notes with action items
• 50% would like to add marketing-ready summaries

Survey Methodology

The 2026 State of AI Translation and Captioning survey was commissioned by Wordly and conducted by Dimensional Research. The study surveyed 205 qualified meeting and event stakeholders from the United States and United Kingdom between May 11 and May 21, 2026. Participants were responsible for external events and/or internal meetings involving multilingual audiences at organizations with more than 1,000 employees.

A complete copy of the 2026 State of AI Translation and Captions is now available here. An infographic highlighting the biggest trends of the survey has also been made available for viewing.

About Dimension Research

Dimensional Research, headquartered in California, provides actionable market research to help innovative companies make smarter business decisions. Its research team brings expertise in enterprise technology markets, with a client roster that includes companies across work management, IT management, enterprise AI, security, manufacturing, data solutions, and beyond.

About Wordly

Wordly is a pioneer and leader in AI translation, providing real-time translation, live captions, transcripts, and AI-generated summaries for meetings and events. A 2025 Inc. 5000 company, Wordly is trusted by more than 5,000 organizations and 6 million users across 120+ countries. Since its founding, Wordly has delivered more than 1 billion minutes of live translation and captioning, helping organizations make global communication more inclusive, accessible, and actionable.