Apple’s September product show came with the sort of headline feature that makes demo videos go viral: AirPods that listen to a conversation and serve you a live translation in your ear, powered by Apple Intelligence running on a nearby iPhone. It’s a neat piece of product theatre — until you try to use it in the European Union. Then you’ll discover the feature simply won’t turn on.

Live Translation on AirPods lets a wearer hear spoken words translated into another language through their earbuds. When only one person has AirPods, the iPhone shows the other person’s speech as a translated transcript; when both people wear compatible AirPods, the exchange becomes more seamless and hands-free. Apple says the capability will work on AirPods Pro 3, AirPods Pro 2 and AirPods 4 with ANC, and initially supports English (UK/US), French (France), German, Brazilian Portuguese and Spanish (Spain), with Italian, Japanese, Korean and simplified Chinese planned later this year. The technology relies on Apple Intelligence on iOS 26 and newer devices.

But not, Apple says, if you’re in the EU

That launch note has an eyebrow-raising footnote. Apple’s regional availability page bluntly says: “Live Translation with AirPods is not available if you are in the EU and your Apple Account Country or Region is also in the EU.” In other words, live translation will work in many places — and on the same hardware and software — but it is switched off for people who are both physically inside the EU and who have an EU Apple account.

Apple’s public explanation points away from data-protection nitpicks and at Europe’s competition rulebook. The company has told reporters and posted support notes linking the restriction to obligations it interprets as coming from the Digital Markets Act (DMA), a sweeping EU law that aims to force tech “gatekeepers” to make core platform functions more interoperable with rivals. Apple has previously delayed or limited the rollout of Apple Intelligence features in Europe because of the same regulatory headwinds.

The regulatory backdrop: DMA and the Apple fight

The DMA is relatively new, and Brussels has been aggressive about enforcing it. In March and April of this year, the European Commission issued orders and, in April, non-compliance findings that hit Apple (and Meta) with the first big DMA fines — signalling the Commission intends to police how platform owners expose functionality to competitors. The March decision set out that certain iPhone functions must be made interoperable with rival devices; Brussels followed with guidance on how that interoperability should be implemented. Apple has publicly complained that some of the Commission’s interoperability demands are technically and commercially difficult — and that complying could have privacy or security implications.

The result is a standoff in which Apple, rather than changing the feature today, has chosen to limit who can use it. That, in turn, prompted a sharp reaction from Brussels. A European Commission spokesperson told industry press that Apple’s decision was “a unilateral decision by Apple,” that the Commission hadn’t been consulted, and that it “is not able to understand the nature of Apple’s concerns.” The Commission’s message: the DMA is supposed to preserve innovation and choice, not block it.

Why Apple might be worried (and why the EU is unconvinced)

From Apple’s point of view, a live translation feature looks simple on the surface but touches several hot-button areas regulators have been scrutinising: how audio gets captured and processed, where language models run, whether a third party could route or replay streams, and — crucial under the DMA — whether Apple’s system locks other vendors out of an experience that many EU regulators think should be interoperable.

From Brussels’ side, the DMA’s purpose is clear: if a handful of companies control the platforms that everyone uses, they shouldn’t be able to use that control to deny competitors access to the plumbing of everyday digital life. Regulators have already fined Apple for earlier DMA breaches and are pushing technical answers — not product withdrawals — as the way forward. That’s why the Commission said it didn’t understand Apple’s move to disable the feature rather than work on a technical solution.

What this means for users — and alternatives

For Europeans who were excited about wearing an on-ear translator, the practical takeaway is unpleasantly simple: if you plug in an EU Apple ID and you are physically in the EU, Live Translation on AirPods will be greyed out for now. The UK, Norway and other non-EU countries (or users with non-EU Apple accounts who travel into the EU) are not subject to the same flag in Apple’s support text, so the restriction is narrowly targeted.

If you need live translation today, there are alternatives: Google’s Pixel Buds have had on-device translation for several years and third-party apps (and dedicated pocket translators) offer real-time speech translation without involving Apple Intelligence. Expect a noisy period, though: Apple’s move will accelerate conversations about whether regulators should push harder for fast interoperability fixes, or whether firms will keep using geographic or account-level restrictions as leverage.

This is one of those small product details that quickly turns into a test case for a bigger question: how much control should platform owners keep over the ways their hardware and software talk to the outside world? Apple’s AirPods offer a cool trick — but in Europe, regulators and ecosystem gates have decided that the trick needs a bigger legal and technical conversation before everyone can use it.