> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.vowen.ai/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Interface language

> Run the Vowen interface in any of 18 languages.

Vowen's own interface is fully translated into **18 languages**. Interface language is separate from the language you dictate in, and separate again from the language your meeting summaries are written in. If you are not sure which one you need, see [Three different language settings](#three-different-language-settings) below.

## Changing it

<Tabs>
  <Tab title="In Settings">
    <Steps>
      <Step title="Open Settings">
        Click **Settings** in the left sidebar footer.
      </Step>

      <Step title="Go to Language">
        Select the **Language** section.
      </Step>

      <Step title="Change UI Language">
        The first row is **UI Language**. Pick from the dropdown. It has a search box, so you can type instead of scrolling.
      </Step>
    </Steps>

    The change applies immediately. There is no restart. The menu bar and the tray menu are rebuilt at the same time, so their labels follow too.
  </Tab>

  <Tab title="During onboarding">
    You can switch language before setup is finished. The onboarding window has a small button in the top right, next to the light/dark toggle, showing the current language code. Click it for the full list.

    Picking a language there saves the same setting, so the app is already in your language when onboarding finishes.
  </Tab>
</Tabs>

## Supported languages

| Language              | Shown in the app as | Code    |
| --------------------- | ------------------- | ------- |
| English               | English             | `en`    |
| Bulgarian             | Български           | `bg`    |
| Czech                 | Čeština             | `cs`    |
| German                | Deutsch             | `de`    |
| Spanish               | Español             | `es`    |
| French                | Français            | `fr`    |
| Italian               | Italiano            | `it`    |
| Japanese              | 日本語                 | `ja`    |
| Korean                | 한국어                 | `ko`    |
| Polish                | Polski              | `pl`    |
| Portuguese            | Português           | `pt`    |
| Russian               | Русский             | `ru`    |
| Swedish               | Svenska             | `sv`    |
| Turkish               | Türkçe              | `tr`    |
| Ukrainian             | Українська          | `uk`    |
| Vietnamese            | Tiếng Việt          | `vi`    |
| Chinese (Simplified)  | 简体中文                | `zh`    |
| Chinese (Traditional) | 繁體中文                | `zh-TW` |

The dropdown lists each language under its own name, never an English label, so you can find yours without reading English.

Dates and times throughout the app follow your choice as well. Portuguese formats dates the Brazilian way, and Chinese (Simplified) the mainland way.

<Note>
  The choice is one of the preferences that [Cloud Sync](/features/cloud-sync) carries between your devices, so setting it once covers your other machines.
</Note>

## Three different language settings

The three are independent. Changing one does not change the others.

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="1. Interface language: what the app's own text is written in">
    Buttons, menus, settings labels, the tray, notifications, dialogs.

    **Where:** Settings > Language > **UI Language**, or the language button in the onboarding toolbar.

    It has no effect on transcription accuracy and no effect on what any AI model produces.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="2. Dictation language: what you speak">
    The language the speech model expects to hear.

    **Where:** Settings > Language > **Dictation Language**.

    The available options depend on the speech model you have selected, because different models support different languages. Some models fix the language outright. With those, the picker is greyed out and explains why, and the row shows the language the model actually uses rather than whatever you had stored. If you switch to a model that does not support your saved language, Vowen resets you to Auto-detect rather than sending a language the model cannot transcribe.

    Full detail: [Languages](/transcription/languages).

    Dictation language can also be overridden in two narrower places, both of which otherwise inherit this setting: per tone, and in the Notes recording defaults.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="3. Summary language: what meeting summaries are written in">
    The language the AI writes your note summaries in, regardless of what language the meeting was held in.

    **Where:** Settings > Language > **Notes Summary Language**.

    The default is **Auto-detect**, which means the summary matches the language of the transcript. Because it is not tied to your speech model, this picker always offers the full catalog.

    It can also be set per template, in the template editor, including on the built-in Meeting Notes template. Resolution order: the template's own override, then your global Notes Summary Language, then Auto-detect.

    See [Summaries](/meeting-notes/summaries).
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

You can run the interface in Japanese, dictate in English, and have your meeting summaries written in French. Nothing about those three choices is linked.

<Note>
  Two related rows live in the same Settings > Language section but are not language *settings* in this sense. **English Spelling** picks American or British spelling and only appears when your dictation language is English or auto-detecting. **Auto-translate** translates your dictation into English and is a Pro feature.
</Note>

## Untranslated strings

Translations are per language file. If a string has not been translated yet in the language you picked, the main app window shows the raw internal key instead of English text, for example `command_palette.placeholder`. There is no per-string fallback to English in the app window.

Menus, dialogs and notifications produced by the app outside the main window do fall back to English for a missing string.

If you see something that looks like a dotted identifier where a label should be, that is a missing translation, not a broken install. Switching **UI Language** to English restores the text while it is fixed.