Localization Localization is the practice of adapting a
film or
television series from one region of the world for another. In contrast to pure translation, localization encompasses adapting the content to suit the target audience. For example, culture-specific references may be replaced, and footage may be removed or added. The new voice track is usually spoken by a
voice actor. In many countries, actors who regularly perform this duty remain little-known, with the exception of particular circles (such as anime
fandom) or when their voices have become synonymous with roles or actors whose voices they usually dub. In the United States, many of these voice artists may employ pseudonyms or go uncredited due to
Screen Actors Guild regulations or the desire to dissociate themselves from the role.
Africa North Africa, Western Asia In
Algeria,
Morocco, and
Tunisia, most foreign movies (especially Hollywood productions) are shown dubbed in French. These movies are usually imported directly from French film distributors. The choice of movies dubbed into French can be explained by the widespread use of the French language. Another important factor is that local theaters and private media companies do not dub in local languages in order to avoid high costs, but also because of the lack of both expertise and demand. Beginning in the 1980s, dubbed series and movies for children in
Modern Standard Arabic became a popular choice among most TV channels, cinemas and VHS/DVD stores. However, dubbed films are still imported, and dubbing is still performed in the
Levant countries with a strong tradition of dubbing (mainly
Syria and
Jordan).
Egypt was the first Arab country in charge of dubbing
Disney movies in 1975 and used to do it exclusively in
Egyptian Arabic rather than
Modern Standard Arabic until 2011, and since then many other companies started dubbing their productions in this dialect. Beginning with
Encanto, Disney movies are now dubbed in both dialects. In the Arabic-speaking countries, children's shows (mainly cartoons and kids sitcoms) are dubbed in Arabic, or Arabic subtitles are used. The only exception was
telenovelas dubbed in Standard Arabic, or dialects, but also Turkish series, most notably
Gümüş, in Syrian Arabic.
South Africa In
South Africa, many television programs were dubbed in
Afrikaans, with the original soundtrack (usually in English, but sometimes
Dutch or
German) "
simulcast" in
FM stereo on
Radio 2000. These included US series such as
The Six Million Dollar Man (Steve Austin: Die Man van Staal),
Miami Vice (Misdaad in Miami),
Beverly Hills 90210, and the German detective series
Derrick. As a result of the
boycott by the
British actors' union
Equity, which banned the sale of most British television programs, the
puppet series
The Adventures of Rupert Bear was dubbed into
South African English, as the original voices had been recorded by Equity voice artists. This practice has declined as a result of the reduction of airtime for the language on
SABC TV, and the increase of locally produced material in Afrikaans on other channels like
KykNet. Similarly, many programs, such as
The Jeffersons, were dubbed into
Zulu, but this has also declined as local drama production has increased. However, some animated films, such as
Maya the Bee, have been dubbed in both Afrikaans and Zulu by local artists. In 2018,
eExtra began showing the Turkish drama series
Paramparça dubbed in Afrikaans as
Gebroke Harte or "Broken Hearts", the first foreign drama to be dubbed in the language for twenty years.
Angola and Mozambique In
Portuguese-speaking countries in Africa, mainly
Angola and
Mozambique, the satellite TV channel
Zap Novelas screens dramas from various countries, including Mexico and Turkey, dubbed in Portuguese by studios in Brazil.
Uganda Uganda's
own film industry is fairly small, and foreign movies are commonly watched. The English soundtrack is often accompanied by the
Luganda translation and comments, provided by a Ugandan "video jockey" (VJ). VJ's interpreting and narration may be available in a recorded form or live.
Asia Azerbaijan Before 2006, most foreign movies and TV shows in Azerbaijan were shown in Russian dubbing, especially in cinemas and on TV channels. However,
AzTV usually aired foreign content with full Azerbaijani dubbing. In 2006, a law was introduced requiring all foreign content on TV channels to be dubbed or voice-overed in Azerbaijani. Following this, most channels switched to Azerbaijani voice-over to follow the new rules. In 2011, a similar law was passed for cinemas. But it didn't have much effect due to the local dubbing industry not being well developed yet. In 2017, the local streaming platform TVSeans began streaming movies and shows with full Azerbaijani dubbing, mainly done by Balans Studio. While full dubs became more common on TV and streaming, home media releases with full dubs remained limited.
China China has a long tradition of dubbing foreign films into
Mandarin Chinese, starting in the 1930s. While during the
Republic of China era Western motion pictures may have been imported and dubbed into Chinese, since 1950
Soviet movies became the main import, sometimes even surpassing the local production. In Communist China, most European movies were dubbed in
Shanghai, whereas Asian and Soviet films were usually dubbed in
Changchun. During the Cultural Revolution, North Korean, Romanian and Albanian films became popular. Beginning in the late 1970s, in addition to films, popular TV series from the United States, Japan, Brazil, and Mexico were also dubbed. has been dubbing movies into the
Tibetan language since the 1960s. In the early decades, it would dub 25 to 30 movies each year, the number rising to 60–75 by the early 2010s. Motion pictures are dubbed for China's
Mongol- and
Uyghur-speaking markets as well.
Japan Japanese dub-over artists provide the voices for certain performers, such as those listed in the following table:
Malaysia Foreign-language programmes and films that air on
TV2 and
TVS are subtitled.
Pakistan In
Pakistan "foreign films", and series are not normally dubbed locally. Instead, foreign films, anime and cartoons, such as those shown on
Nickelodeon Pakistan and
Cartoon Network Pakistan, are dubbed in
Hindi in India, as Hindi and
Urdu, the national language of Pakistan, are
mutually intelligible. However, soap operas from
Turkey are now dubbed in Urdu and have gained increased popularity at the expense of Indian soap operas in Hindi. This has led to protests from local producers that these are a threat to Pakistan's television industry, with local productions being moved out of peak viewing time or dropped altogether. Similarly, politicians and leaders have expressed concerns over their content, given Turkey's less conservative culture.
Singapore In multilingual
Singapore, dubbing is rare for western programs. English-language programs on the free-to-air terrestrial channels are usually subtitled in Chinese or Malay. Chinese, Malay and Tamil programs (except for news bulletins and other live shows), usually have subtitles in English and the original language during the prime time hours.
Dual sound programs, such as Korean, Japanese and Filipino dramas, exist.
Thailand In
Thailand, foreign television programs are dubbed in
Thai, but the original soundtrack is often simultaneously carried on a
NICAM audio track on terrestrial broadcast, and alternate audio tracks on satellite broadcast. Previously, terrestrial stations simulcasted the original soundtrack on the radio.
Vietnam In
Vietnam, foreign-language films and programs are often subtitled or
voice-overed on television in
Vietnamese. They were not dubbed until 1985.
Rio was considered to be the very first American Hollywood film to be entirely dubbed in
Vietnamese. Since then, children's films that came out afterwards have been released dubbed in theaters.
HTV3 has dubbed television programs for children, including
Ben 10, and ''
Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide'', by using various voice actors to dub over the character roles.
Europe Children's/family films and programming In
North-West Europe,
Poland,
Portugal,
Balkan,
Baltic and
Nordic countries, generally only movies and TV shows that are intended for children are dubbed, while TV shows and movies that are intended for teenagers or adults are subtitled, although adult-animated productions (e.g.
South Park and
The Simpsons) have a tradition of being dubbed. For movies in cinemas with clear target audiences (both below and above 10–11 years of age), both a dubbed and a subtitled version are usually available.
Croatia On 1 October 2008,
Nova TV launched its sister channel Mini TV, the first Croatian television channel for children with programming entirely dubbed into Croatian.
RTL followed suit with the launch of
RTL Kockica in 2014. Since the 2010s, the dubbing of live-action television series and films aimed at children, teenagers and young adults has been on the rise. With the launch of
Nickelodeon's
Croatian audio track in 2011, Studio NET was the first in Croatia to focus on "serious production of live-action dubbing," with most of Nickelodeon's major teen live-action titles such as
iCarly (2007–2012),
Sam & Cat (2013–2014),
The Thundermans (2013–2018) and
Victorious (2010–2013) receiving a Croatian dub. With the rise of
streaming television in the 2020s, NET and various other studios also began producing Croatian dubs for
Netflix; although the focus is still on dubbing animated series and films, a notable amount of live-action programming aimed at younger audiences has also been dubbed for Netflix, such as
Chupa (2023),
Geek Girl (2024),
Heartstopper (2022–2024),
I Woke Up a Vampire (2023),
Matilda the Musical (2022) and
Spy Kids: Armageddon (2023).
Portugal In
Portugal, dubbing was banned under a 1948 law as a way of protecting the domestic film industry and reducing access to culture as most of the population was illiterate. Until 1994, animated movies, as well as other TV series for children, were shown subtitled in Portugal along with imported
Brazilian Portuguese dubs due to the lack of interest from Portuguese companies in the dubbing industry. This lack of interest was justified, since there were already quality dubbed copies of shows and movies in Portuguese made by
Brazilians.
The Lion King was the first feature film to be dubbed in
European Portuguese. Currently, all movies for children are dubbed. Subtitles are preferred in Portugal, used in every foreign-language
documentary, TV series and film. The exception to this preference is when children are the target audience.
Romania In
Romania, virtually all programs intended for children are dubbed in
Romanian. Animated movies are shown in theaters with Romanian dubbing. However, cinemas with more screening rooms usually also provide the original subtitled version. Other foreign TV shows and movies are shown in the original language with Romanian subtitles. Subtitles are usually preferred in the Romanian market. According to "Special Eurobarometer 243" (graph QA11.8) of the
European Commission (research carried out in November and December 2005), 62% of Romanians prefer to watch foreign films and programs with subtitles (rather than dubbed), 22% prefer dubbing, and 16% declined to answer. This is led by the assumption that watching movies in their original versions is very useful for learning foreign languages. However, according to the same Eurobarometer, virtually no Romanian found this method—watching movies in their original version—to be the most efficient way to learn foreign languages, compared to 53 percent who preferred language lessons at school.
United Kingdom Hinterland displays a not so common example of a bilingual production. Each scene is filmed twice, in the English and Welsh languages, apart from a few scenes where Welsh with subtitles is used for the English version.
France In
France, dubbing is the norm. Most movies with a theatrical release, including all those from major distributors, are dubbed. Those that are not, are foreign
independent films whose budget for international distribution is limited, or foreign
art films with a niche audience. Almost all theaters show movies with their French dubbing ("VF", short for ). Some of them also offer screenings in the original language ("VO", short for ), generally accompanied with French subtitles ("VOST", short for ). A minority of theaters (usually small ones) screen exclusively in the original language. According to the
CNC (National Centre for Cinematography), VOST screenings accounted for 16.9% of tickets sold in France. In addition, dubbing is required for home entertainment and television screenings. However, since the
advent of digital television, foreign programs are broadcast to
television viewers in both languages (sometimes, French with
audio description is also aired); while the French-language track is selected by default, viewers can switch to the original-language track and enable French subtitles. As a special case, the binational television channel
Arte broadcasts both the French and German dubbing, in addition to the original-language version.
Germany, Austria, Switzerland Unlike in Austria and Germany, cinemas in German-speaking Switzerland historically strongly preferred subtitled versions of foreign-language films. Swiss film distributors commissioned dual-language prints with both German and French subtitles as the primary version, with the dubbed version also shown. In recent years, however, there has been a shift towards dubbed versions, which now account for the majority of showings.
Hungary In
Hungary, dubbing is almost universally common. Almost every foreign movie or TV show released in Hungary is dubbed into Hungarian. The history of dubbing dates back to the 1950s, when the country was still under communist rule. One of the most iconic Hungarian dubs was of the American cartoon
The Flintstones, with a local translation by
József Romhányi. The Internetes Szinkron Adatbázis (ISzDB) is the largest Hungarian database for film dubs, with information for many live action and animated films. On page 59 of the Eurobarometer, 84% of Hungarians said that they prefer dubbing over subtitles. In the 1980s, due to budget cuts, state-run TV saved on tapes by voicing films over live during transmission. Overall, during 1948–1998, almost 1,000 films were dubbed in Polish. In the 1990s, dubbing films and TV series continued, although often also for one emission only. In 1995,
Canal+ was launched in Poland. In its first years, it dubbed 30% of its schedule, including popular films and TV series such as
Friends, but this proved unsuccessful.
Spain In
Spain, dubbing has been more widespread since 1932, when the
Second Republic decided to introduce it in Madrid and Barcelona. The first film dubbed into Spanish to be known was
Devil and the Deep, in 1932. This law had two political purposes: Nationalism through linguistic identity and, more subtly, control through censorship of foreign ideas that could be alien to national interests.
Latin America Brazil In
Brazil, foreign programs are invariably dubbed into
Brazilian Portuguese on
free-to-air TV, with only a few exceptions. Films shown at cinemas are generally offered with both subtitled and dubbed versions, with dubbing frequently being the only choice for children's movies. Subtitling was primarily for adult audience movies until 2012. Since then, dubbed versions also became available for all ages. As a result, in recent years, more cinemas have opened in Brazil, attracting new audiences to the cinema who prefer dubbing. According to a
Datafolha survey, 56% of Brazilian movie theaters' audience prefer to watch dubbed movies. Most of the dubbing studios in Brazil are in the cities of
Rio de Janeiro and
São Paulo. The first film to be dubbed in Brazil was the
Disney animation
"Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" in 1938. By the end of the 1950s, most of the movies, TV series and cartoons on television in Brazil were shown in its original sound and subtitles. However, in 1961, a decree of President
Jânio Quadros ruled that all foreign productions on television should be dubbed. This measure boosted the growth of dubbing in Brazil, and has led to several dubbing studios since then. The biggest dubbing studio in Brazil was
Herbert Richers, headquartered in
Rio de Janeiro and closed in 2009. At its peak in the 80s and 90s, the Herbert Richers studios dubbed about 70% of the productions shown in Brazilian cinemas.
Mexico Dubbing must be made in Mexico by Mexican nationals or foreigners residing in Mexico.
North America French-speaking Canada Like in
France, dubbing is the most common and most popular translation method for films and television shows in French-speaking
Canada. This became the norm in the mid-1940s. Most films and television shows dubbed in French-speaking Canada are dubbed in a
"neutral" or "international" French to be understandable by a broad Francophone audience regardless of
the region and to give prestige to
Canadian French. Despite the goal of being understandable to all Francophones, dubs from French-speaking Canada are not popular in France due to their own laws regarding dubs and the fact that "neutral" French is disliked by the French.
Universal Pictures, the film's distributor, gave the French-speaking Canada dubbing rights to Hubert Fielden, a Frenchman who lived in
Quebec. Fielden decided to make the Canadian French dub in uncensored joual. The film was written by a Québécois and stars Québécois actors, but the decision to dub the film in joual was to make it resonate even further with a French-Canadian audience. The joual dub ended up being immensely popular in Quebec and Lancer-frappé became a cult classic in French-speaking Canada. Until the 1980s, the vast majority French-language dubbed films in Quebec were imported from France. The
government of Quebec, under then-premier
Robert Bourassa and with the support of the then-minister of Culture and Cultural Affairs
Denis Hardy, passed the Act Respecting the Cinema in 1975. The Act mandated that all foreign language films shown in Quebec must be dubbed in French. This, along with the aftermath of the
Quiet Revolution and the rise of the
Quebec sovereignty movement, led to the immense popularity of dubs made in French-speaking Canada in the late 1970s. In 2003,
Howard Ryshpan and Jocelyne Côté, the founders of the Québécois dubbing studio Ryshco Media, created the dubbing software DubStudio. The software was created as a way to automize the lip-synch band, the most commonly used dubbing method in use since the 1950s. According to Ryshpan and Côté, the goal of the software is to "become the global standard of dubbing methods and automated dialogue replacement." DubStudio was collaborated with the Centre de Recherche Informatique de Montréal (CRIM) who also worked on electronic
directory assistance for telephones. The software detects the film or television show's dialogue, detects the length, and transforms it into
phonemes. The script, already inputted into the software, is also transformed into phonemes. The software then combines the two sets of phonemes to create an electronic equivalent of a lip-synch band and then transforms the phonemes into text. The origin of Bill 193 came after Dumont took his children to see the French dub of
Shrek the Third. The film was dubbed in European French, which Dumont found incomprehensible. Bill 193 was also supported by the
Parti Québécois, the same party who created the Act Respecting the Cinema that the ADQ sought to amend. The
Quebec Liberal Party, who at the time held a minority government led by then-premier
Jean Charest, was against the bill. The first television show to be dubbed in joual was
The Flintstones which premiered under in French-speaking Canada under the name
Les Pierrafeu in 1971. However, the most popular French-Canadian dub is the Québécois dub of the television show
The Simpsons which premiered in 1991, Like the film
Slap Shot, the show was dubbed in joual to make it more relatable to a Québécois audience. Additionally, the American pop culture references and celebrities are localized with French-Canadian ones. Examples include replacing the
Denver Broncos gridiron football team with the
Montreal Alouettes, characters talking about
CÉGEP (Quebec's college system), and an American politician being replaced by former prime minister of Canada
Brian Mulroney. References to the French language itself are also changed, often poking fun at the different regional accents. For instance, in season 1 episode 11 "
The Crepes of Wrath", the character
Bart Simpson goes on a student exchange trip to France. A major recurring joke in the original episode is that no one is able to understand him because he does not speak French. In the Québécois dub, the joke is changed to Bart's Québécois accent being incomprehensible to the French. However, Disney also acquired the dub from Corus to broadcast on their streaming platform
Disney+. Corus claims that this decreases revenue and viewers from their own television channel. This disagreement also applies to the other Corus-produced French-Canadian dubs of Disney television shows, notably
Family Guy and
American Dad. Shortly afterwards, Joshua Biasotto created a petition titled Sauvons le doublage québécois des Simpsons (Let's save the Québécois dub of The Simpsons) on the website
change.org. The petition received thousands of signatures within a few hours and as of November 2025 has over 31,000 verified signatures. Like in
English-speaking Canada, the
Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) mandates French television services for the visually and audibly impaired. Unlike most of its films and television shows, French-speaking Canada uses
voiceovers for described video and
audio description for the visually impaired. As for the deaf community, Quebec has its own sign language:
Quebec Sign Language. While most films and television shows use subtitles, dubs in Quebec Sign Language are becoming more common.
Radio-Canada, the French public broadcaster of Canada, offers some news programs dubbed in Quebec Sign Language. Quebec's public broadcaster
Télé-Québec has also started dubbing some of its shows in Quebec Sign Language in collaboration with the
Ministry of Education and Higher Education and the Office des personnes handicapées du Québec (OPHQ). Dubbing is also common in
Indigenous languages of Canada. In 1999, the
Aboriginal Peoples Television Network (APTN) launched as the first national
Indigenous broadcaster in the world. Initially, 60 hours per week were dedicated to
Indigenous languages, while the rest of the channel's programming was in English and French. The movies and television shows that were not originally created in an Indigenous language were given full dubs in an Indigenous language. In 2024, APTN changed its format by launching APTN Languages – a new channel dedicated entirely to programming in 18 Indigenous languages. The main channel was rededicated to English and French programming, and the Indigenous-language programs were moved to the new channel. As of December 2025, APTN Languages airs two television shows dubbed in Michif: Michif Country and Red River Gold. There are two
labour unions that represent the dubbing industry in French-speaking Canada:
Union des artistes (UDA) and the National Association of Professional Dubbers (ANDP). The UDA was founded in 1937 as the Association nationale des doubleurs professionnels to represent singers in Quebec. The union later became the UDA in 1952. Today, the UDA represents around 13,000 actors, singers, animators, and dancers across Quebec. The ANDP, which represents specifically the dubbing industry, was founded in 1976 as the Association québécoise des industries techniques du cinéma et de la television. The union adopted its current name in 2005. Over 1,250 people in the Canadian dubbing industry are represented by the ANDP. For a
cartoon, a
fiction television series, a commission, or a
direct-to-video or direct-to-streaming film, dubbers make $142.57 for the first hour and $42.78 for every additional half-hour. For
feature films, the rate is $154.46 for the first hour and $46.34 for every additional half-hour.
Narration and voiceover make $121.48 for the first hour and $36.45 for every additional half-hour. Voice directors work nine-hour workdays from Monday to Friday and consists of 2 or 3 recording sessions per day. They earn $87.15 per hour for cartoons, $92.41 per hour for fiction television series, $116.22 per hour for feature films, $58.26 for narration and voiceovers, $89.63 per hour for Canadian direct-to-video and direct-to-streaming films, $89.72 per hour for commissions, and $95.72 per hour for international direct-to-video and direct-to-streaming films. If a voice director owns a studio but is not directing the dub, they earn $148.52 per hour for half-hour length cartoons, narration, voiceovers, and Canadian direct-to-video and direct-to-streaming films; $237.62 per hour for hour length cartoons, narration, voiceovers, and Canadian direct-to-video and direct-to-streaming films; and $504.95 per hour for fiction television series, feature films, and commissions. Dubbing translators are paid $2.12 per line for cartoons and $1.64 for any additional line. For drama television series, they are paid $1.97 per line if 30 minutes long or less and $2.21 per line if over 30 minutes. The rates for feature films are $3.34 per line for the first 1,500 lines, $2.32 per line for the next 1,000 lines, and $2.01 per line for any additional lines. Rates for narration and voiceovers range from $128.37 per line for audio 7 minutes long or less to $2,053.97 for two-hour-long audio. For direct-to-video or direct-to-streaming productions, dubbing translators earn $2.91 per line for the first 1,500 lines and $1.83 for any additional line for Canadian productions and $3.02 per line for the first 1,500 lines and $1.90 for any additional line for international productions. Rates for commissions are $2.21 per line.
United States and English-speaking Canada In the
United States and
English-speaking Canada,
live-action foreign films are usually shown in theaters with their original languages and English subtitles. It is because live-action dubbed movies rarely did well in United States box office since the 1980s. The 1982 United States theatrical release of Wolfgang Petersen's
Das Boot was the last major release to go out in both original and English-dubbed versions, and the film's original version actually grossed much higher than the English-dubbed version. Later on, English-dubbed versions of international hits like
Un indien dans la ville,
Godzilla 2000,
Anatomy,
Pinocchio, The Return of Godzilla and
High Tension flopped at United States box offices. When
Miramax planned to release the English-dubbed versions of
Shaolin Soccer and
Hero in the United States cinemas, their English-dubbed versions scored badly in test screenings in the United States, so Miramax finally released the films in United States cinemas with their original language. Still, English-dubbed movies have much better commercial potential in
ancillary markets; therefore, more distributors would release live-action foreign films in theaters with their original languages (with English subtitles), then release both original versions and English-dubbed versions in ancillary markets. Many films have also been dubbed into indigenous languages of the United States and Canada.
Disney's
Moana, set in
Hawaii, was dubbed into the
Hawaiian language in 2018. The
Navajo language has also received dubs of many films, the first three being
Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (),
Finding Nemo () and
Fistful of Dollars (). The Navajo dubs of
Star Wars and
Finding Nemo are also available on
Disney Plus.
Oceania Australia Because over 25% of Australians speak a language other than English at home, some cinemas show foreign-language films, for example in Chinese (the most spoken language in Australia other than English). There are also Chinese-language cinemas in Australia, such as the
Hoyts Mandarin cinema in
Chatswood,
Sydney. The first film to be dubbed into an
Australian Aboriginal language was
Fists of Fury, a Hong Kong
martial arts film, which was dubbed into the
Nyungar language of the
Perth region in 2021. The first
Indigenous Australian cartoon,
Little J & Big Cuz, is available in
English and several indigenous languages, including
Gija, Nyungar,
Torres Strait Creole,
Palawa Kani,
Warlpiri,
Yolŋu,
Arrernte,
Pitjantjatjara and
Kriol.
French Polynesia French Polynesia almost exclusively shows films and television programs in either French or English. However, in 2016, Disney's
Moana became the first film to be dubbed into the
Tahitian language.
New Zealand Many episodes of
SpongeBob SquarePants () and
Dora the Explorer () were dubbed into Māori and shown on
Māori Television to promote the Māori language among children.
Disney has also started dubbing films into Māori. These films are shown in cinemas in New Zealand and some parts of Australia and then released globally on
Disney+. In 2019, the film
Moana was dubbed into Māori. In 2022,
The Lion King () and
Frozen were dubbed into Māori. ==Alternatives==