AutoDub vs LivDub
We make AutoDub, so read this with that in mind. But people keep landing on our site after searching for LivDub, and the two get lumped together when they really don't work the same way. This is the comparison we'd want to read.
LivDub details checked in August 2026 against livdub.com and its Chrome Web Store listing. If something has changed since, tell us at hi@autodub.net and we'll fix it.
Which one should you use?
If you mostly watch YouTube, use AutoDub. It's free with no daily cap, there's no API key to set up, the dub stays locked to the video, you get bilingual subtitles, you pick the voice, and it runs in Firefox as well as Chrome, Edge and Brave.
If you need dubbing somewhere other than YouTube, use LivDub. It dubs the audio of any Chrome tab: a news site, a Twitch stream, a webinar. You pay for that flexibility three ways. You set up a Google Gemini API key and pay Google once you're past its free tier. LivDub's own free plan cuts off after 45 minutes a day. And the dub runs a couple of seconds behind the speaker.
Side-by-side comparison
| AutoDub | LivDub | |
|---|---|---|
| Where it works | YouTube only, as a button inside the YouTube player | Any Chrome tab that is playing sound: news, streams, webinars, YouTube |
| How the dub is made | Reads the video's captions, translates them, and speaks them with an AI voice in sync with the video | Records the tab's audio, streams it to Google Gemini, plays back Gemini's spoken translation |
| Delay | Synced to the video timeline; pause, seek and speed changes stay aligned | Near real time, usually 2 seconds or so behind the speaker |
| Setup | Install and press play. No account, no API key | Install, create a Google Gemini API key, paste it into the extension |
| Price | Free for personal use, no daily limit | Free for 45 active minutes a day; Plus is $5/month or $50/year. Gemini usage past the free tier is billed by Google to your account, $0.037 per audio minute (about $2.20/hour) |
| Languages and voices | 42 target languages, 90+ voices, you pick the voice | 75+ target languages, voiced by Gemini |
| Subtitles | Bilingual subtitles included, free | Translated captions on the Plus plan |
| Browsers | Chrome, Edge, Brave and Firefox | Chrome 116+ |
| Needs | The video must have captions (auto-generated captions count) | The tab must be actively playing sound, plus your own Gemini key |
| Where your data goes | Captions are processed on AutoDub servers; results are cached per video, not per user | Audio goes to Google Gemini under your own key; LivDub says it never sees your key or audio |
Two different machines
LivDub is speech-to-speech. It records whatever the tab is playing, sends the audio to Gemini under your key, and plays Gemini's spoken translation over the top. Because it works from sound, it doesn't care what site you're on. It also can't speak until it has heard a sentence, so there's always a gap of a couple of seconds.
AutoDub is caption-to-speech. It pulls the YouTube video's caption track, translates it, and speaks each line at the timestamp where it belongs. Working from text instead of sound is what makes it YouTube-only. It's also what lets the dub survive pausing, scrubbing and 2x playback, and lets it show the original and translated lines together as bilingual subtitles. The limit is obvious: no captions, no dub. Auto-generated captions are enough.
What it costs
Both are free to install. Where they part ways is the hours you actually spend watching.
LivDub has two meters. One is LivDub's: 45 active minutes a day free, then $5 a month for Plus. The other is Google's: the Gemini key you bring is metered. Google's free tier covers light use, with rate limits. Past it, audio in and out of the Live Translate model is billed at Google's list price, which was $0.037 a minute in August 2026. Call it $2.20 for an hour of dubbing, charged to your Google account.
AutoDub has no meter. A two-hour lecture costs the same as a two-minute clip.
Privacy
LivDub's pitch is that nothing goes through LivDub: your key and your audio go straight to Google, and LivDub only keeps anonymous usage stats. AutoDub never touches your audio at all. We send the video's caption text (not your mic, not your tab) to our servers to build the dub, cache the result per video so the next person gets it instantly, and never ask you to sign in. The full version is in our privacy policy.
If the YouTube half of this is what you need, AutoDub is a one-click install. The AutoDub button shows up in the player the next time you open a video.
Add AutoDub to Chrome — FreeFrequently asked questions
Is LivDub free?
Partly. LivDub's own plan is free for 45 active minutes a day; unlimited dubbing, translated captions and audio export are on LivDub Plus at $5 a month or $50 a year. On top of that, the Gemini API key you bring is metered by Google. There's a rate-limited free tier; past it, Google bills your account per minute of audio. At the August 2026 list price for the Live Translate model that's $0.037 a minute, which works out to about $2.20 for an hour of dubbing.
Is AutoDub free?
Yes. No daily limit, no account, no API key. Install it, open a YouTube video, pick a language, press play.
Does AutoDub work outside YouTube?
No. It's built for YouTube only. If you want to dub a news site, a live stream or a webinar in another tab, LivDub is the one to use.
Which one sounds better?
Different, not better. AutoDub gives you 90+ voices to pick from and keeps the dub pinned to the video's timeline. LivDub uses Gemini's live speech, which follows the speaker in near real time with a short delay. Try both on a video you already know and trust your ears.
Can I use both?
Yes, and it's a reasonable setup: AutoDub for YouTube, LivDub for everything else. Just don't run both on the same tab. LivDub records the tab's audio, so it would pick up AutoDub's dub and re-dub that.
If you're new to all this, our explainer on what "auto-dubbed" means on YouTube is the place to start, and the dubbing extension page goes into what AutoDub does in more depth.