i have been playing a bit more (with Thai-English) translations with the Timekettle W4 Pro translation device.

 

i wanted to try out the capability of these Timekettle W4 Pro earbuds to translate a voice phone call.   It took me a LONG time to configure (to get this working) due to a setting on my Android phone that was blocking the phone call translation of the app.  It took me over 2 hours to realize a sort of system setting (related to permissions) was causing the issue.  ... i.e. a permission that was NOT in the nominal permissions list.

 

I tested with my Thai wife.

 

On an Android phone, there is an 'overlay' permission or an 'on top of' setting permission (which is bloody difficult to find) that needs to be set for the Timekettle to translate a phone call, where the person calling me speaks Thai (and I hear English)  , and I speak English into the TimeKettle's mic (and they hear Thai speech).  Its not ideal.  Again there can be up to an 8 second delay before the translation starts. BUT if one puts many pauses between words, and speaks slower, the translation (over the phone) works significantly better - where one does not experience the 8 second delay.  Also, both parties can be talking at the same time (but being certain to insert many pauses) and the translation works for both, simultaneously.  The translation is not perfect, but its mostly ok.

 

I also had the translation working with a voice call over the Line app.  Again, the translation is NOT perfect. Some Thai words/expressions my wife used simply made no sense when translated. Fortunately massively more worked than did not work.

 

I want to try with other phone apps using voice call functions (such as WhatsApp) but my wife had some other things to do, so that will need to be tested on some other occasion.

 

Over all, I am moderately pleased.  I will thou,  if i answer a phone call, have to ask the Thai speaker to both speak  very slow, and also ask them to insert many pauses into what they say, in order to get a better translation.   

 

The plus side to this, is it now opens the door better to communicate with my wife's family, if i need to do so when my wife not available.  Until now i have relied on Google translations of Thai text, pasted into social media Line app and copied out of Line app.  I now have a voice translation possibility.

 

I do want to qualify this by saying this is far from perfect. Obviously it is far better if one can speak some Thai.

I doubt it translates slang and isaan which Thai's use a lot. Downloading Thai so can use offline would have been essential for me, Internet signal varies when outside

44 minutes ago, scubascuba3 said:

I doubt it translates slang and isaan which Thai's use a lot. Downloading Thai so can use offline would have been essential for me, Internet signal varies when outside

 

Of the dozen(s) of translation devices,I only read of one that claims to do that, and I have not read of it in any of the top reviews.  So I discarded and deliberately forgot about/ignored it.

 

Where I live in Thailand a weak internet signal is relatively rare.

On 12/9/2025 at 5:35 PM, oldcpu said:

i have been playing a bit more (with Thai-English) translations with the Timekettle W4 Pro translation device.

 

 

I've been playing more with the TimeKettle W4 pro. 

 

GROUP USE with Timekettle W4 Pro:

 

We have a Thai friend of my wife's over for a few days, and they are mostly only chatting with each other in Thai language. On occasions when spending time in the same room as them, with the earbuds on, and if I set the Android Timekettle app (on my smartphone) to "Listen and Speak" (but in listen submode) , any words detected by my smartphone are translated to English , and the translation then sent to the Timekettle W4 pro earbuds.  Its pretty good and gets most of the conversation, but not all.  There are limitations:

 

(1) Thai-English is an offline language, so there is about an 8 second pause by the time the Thai is converted to text, translated (using an online translation database) and then sent to the Timekettle W4 bluetooth earbuds, and

 

(2) If i want to speak (when in this 'listen-speak' mode, I need to press 'speak' on my phone (or tap somewhere on the earbuds - I haven't figured that out yet) and then any English words I speak are translated to Thai language and come out the smartphone speaker.  Again, there is an 8-second pause (about) and while I am speaking and while the 8-second pause (to translate from English to Thai), any Thai spoken is not translated to English, and

 

(3) If set to "listen" in the "listen-and-speak" mode, there is no voice identification. This means all voices in the translation to English sound alike and one has to make an educated guess as to whom in the group stated what in Thai language.

 

(4) the translation is NOT perfect, but for certain I do get a large amount of what is being stated.  Reference 'Thai dialect' I can't comment knowledgeably on that. My wife is from the south of Thailand, and her friend is from Bangkok.  According to them , they definitely do NOT converse with a northern isaan accent.

 

(5) if anyone thou (other than myself wearing the earbuds) speaks English, the Timekettle in their effort to translate English-to-English (going through a Thai-to-English conversion) comes out mostly garbage.

 

THAI news on TV using Timekettle W4 Pro

 

My wife was watching Thai news on our TV. I was able to use my earbuds to listen to almost all of the Thai news broadcast, with Thai translated to English.

 

ONE-ON-ONE - each with an ear bud in an ear (using Timekettle W4 Pro)

 

One on one use is where the Timekettle really shines.  I put the right 'on-you-ear' earbud over my ear, and my wife's friend put the left 'on-your-ear' earbud over her left ear, and we had a decent conversation.

 

Further, our maid (who only speaks Thai) was at our place cleaning, so we tried out the TimeKettle W4 pro with her.  Again, I put the right 'on-you-ear' earbud over my ear, and our maid put the left 'on-your-ear' earbud over her left ear, and we had a decent conversation.  The maid was most impressed.

 

She has English, French, German, Russian and Chinese clients whose places she cleans and our maid wanted to know how much the Timekettle W4pro cost.  Of course, the price was FAR beyond her budget.

 

But THAT had me thinking, and I ordered a relatively new earbud that is 1/5 th !!!! the cost, that does translation, and if that works, I plan to give such to our maid as a gift.

 

Soundcore Aerofit 2 

 

I ordered the Soundcore Aerofit 2 earbuds (as noted above, intended as a gift).  They are 1/5th the price of the Timekettle W4 Pro.  These Soundcore Aerofit 2 earbuds are known to have very good music play back, and until recently had NO translation functionality.  However recently Soundcore pushed out a firmware upgrade to these earbuds to give them an online translation functionality, where early reviews suggest it does a decent job in translation (in comparison to competition). 

 

If they work moderately ok, at 1/5th the cost of the Timekettle, I will give these to our maid as a gift.  Unfortunately they won't arrive until mid-January next year, so they are more likely to be an Easter gift than a Christmas gift.  

 

The Soundcore Aerofit 2 earbuds do NOT have the Timekettle's 'one-on-one' mode, which is the mode that the Timekettle is mostly known for. Also i believe (albeit not certain) the Soundcore also don't integrate with the phone, allowing phone-calls, and social media vocal chats to be translated (unlike the Timekettle which allows such) .  ... But I can't be certain yet.  I will check this out when these less expensive earbuds arrive. Again, the Soundcore Aerofit 2 original claim to fame was good music quality, so i am rather curious (and skeptical) as to how well it will work with audio translation.

 

 

 

1 hour ago, oldcpu said:

The Soundcore Aerofit 2 earbuds do NOT have the Timekettle's 'one-on-one' mode, which is the mode that the Timekettle is mostly known for

As mentioned, my old Soundcore Liberty2 earbuds support translation & the soundcore app sort of has a "One-On-One" mode albeit they call it "Face-to-Face" where one person is using the phone and the other the earbuds... 

 

Have just checked on the "One-Click" translation app that my 3 cheap (<£30 each) Chinese ones use and it has 3 different modes:-

• Touch Mode: Two people each wear a headset. Click or double-click the headset to translate in real-time. Suitable for acquaintances who are willing to wear your headphones. This would be the same as "One-on-One" mode
• Speaker Mode: One person wears headphones, and one person holds a mobile phone. Suitable for strangers who find wearing headphones inconvenient. This would be the same as "Face-to-Face" mode on the Soundcore app.
• Free Talk Mode: Each person wears a headset to translate in real-time, freeing their hands and communicating freely. - This is where each person uses their own headsets.

The One-Click app has Thai as one of it's supported Offline languages... 

Currently 150+ languages are supported.

Offline translation supports 16 languages: Chinese(Simplified),English(United States),Japanese,Korean,French,German,Spanish,Russian,Chinese(Traditional),Thai,Arabic, Hindi, Vietnamese, Portuguese,Indonesian,Italian.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=link.zhidou.btranslator&hl=en

 

Looking in the App, Offline Mode is a paid for service, 399 THB for a 2 year subscription, I don't know if there's an additional charge per language pack etc... 

 

Phone/Video Calls are also a premium service, 399THB for 60 minutes… 

55 minutes ago, SamSpade said:

Touch Mode: Two people each wear a headset. Click or double-click the headset to translate in real-time. Suitable for acquaintances who are willing to wear your headphones. This would be the same as "One-on-One" mode

I've just tested this out with the GF and it's a little bit annoying as the person with the phone needs to push the left or right "Microphone" Icon for the person who's speaking, but the translation is pretty instant.

 

55 minutes ago, SamSpade said:

Free Talk Mode: Each person wears a headset to translate in real-time, freeing their hands and communicating freely. - This is where each person uses their own headsets. This is a Handsfree version of Touch Mode.

 

EDIT: Done a little digging online and it seems that this is more like a Hands Free "Touch"/ "One-To-One" mode where each person wears one of the Earbuds. 

 

I'm guessing if I wanted to set it up so we both had our own earbuds, I would need to install the One-Click app on the GFs phone and connect the 2nd set to there.

 

 

BTW the translation is more or less instant, am using it to 1/2 listen to a Thai (Technically Korean but language is set to Thai) Soap that the GF is watching...  

2 hours ago, SamSpade said:

As mentioned, my old Soundcore Liberty2 earbuds support translation & the soundcore app sort of has a "One-On-One" mode albeit they call it "Face-to-Face" where one person is using the phone and the other the earbuds... 

 

Have just checked on the "One-Click" translation app that my 3 cheap (<£30 each) Chinese ones use and it has 3 different modes:-

• Touch Mode: Two people each wear a headset. Click or double-click the headset to translate in real-time. Suitable for acquaintances who are willing to wear your headphones. This would be the same as "One-on-One" mode
• Speaker Mode: One person wears headphones, and one person holds a mobile phone. Suitable for strangers who find wearing headphones inconvenient. This would be the same as "Face-to-Face" mode on the Soundcore app.
• Free Talk Mode: Each person wears a headset to translate in real-time, freeing their hands and communicating freely. - This is where each person uses their own headsets.

 

 

 

Based on your description, the Timekettle One-on-One mode is NOT the touch mode you describe.

 

Rather the Timekettle one-on-one mode corresponds closer to the Free Talk mode you described.

 

One person has right earphone. The other has the left earphone. And they just talk (in different languages) . No more button pushing required.  The phone's mic/speakers are not in use in this mode.

 

I also learned the about 8-second lag I observed is likely due to my having an older very basic Android phone, where that lag can be cut by 1/2 to 1/3 of what i experience now if I go to a newer (or more powerful phone).

 

I guess I should move to a newer android phone, but i hate doing that, as i find it a PIA to change phones.

15 minutes ago, oldcpu said:

Based on your description, the Timekettle One-on-One mode is NOT the touch mode you describe.

 

Rather the Timekettle one-on-one mode corresponds closer to the Free Talk mode you described.

Agreed... 

 

 

On 11/25/2025 at 2:40 PM, shdmn said:

 

If you use Google Pixel earbuds the mic on those will supposedly work with the Google Translate app.  I don't think there is any technical reason why the mic on generic earbuds can't work but they apparently don't with Google Translate.  Perhaps they will on some other translate app.

 

It does work with the mic on my generic wired headphones.

 

Google appear to be implementing an update to Google translation , such that (IMHO) it can better compete with the more dedicated earbuds :

Bringing state-of-the-art Gemini translation capabilities to Google Translate 

( https://blog.google/products/search/gemini-capabilities-translation-upgrades/ )

 

Go to the link for the full article (date 12-Dec-2025). Here are some extracts:

Quote

 

We’re bringing Gemini’s most powerful translation capabilities to Google Translate for text, launching a beta experience for live speech-to-speech translations with headphones, and adding new languages to the app for practice and skill building.
...
Starting today, Google Translate uses advanced Gemini capabilities to better improve translations on phrases with more nuanced meanings like idioms, local expressions or slang.
...
This update is rolling out starting today in the U.S. and India translating between English and nearly 20 languages, including Spanish, Hindi, Chinese, Japanese and German, in the Translate app (Android and iOS) and on the web.
...
Hear and understand the world in real-time

 

Building on Gemini’s new live speech-to-speech translation capabilities, we are rolling out a beta experience enabling you to hear real-time translations in your headphones. This new experience works to preserve the tone, emphasis and cadence of each speaker to create more natural translations and make it easier to follow along with who said what. Whether you're trying to have a conversation in a different language, listen to a speech or lecture while abroad, or watch a TV show or film in another language, you can now put in your headphones, open the Translate app, tap “Live translate” and hear a real-time translation in your preferred language.
...
Starting today the beta is rolling out in the Translate app on Android in the U.S., Mexico, and India, works with any pair of headphones, and supports more than 70 languages. And we’ll be bringing it to iOS and more countries in 2026.

 

 

So it won't be until sometime in year 2026 that the improvements will be rolled out for the Thai language.

.