Estonian live captions and productivity tool for communicating with deaf & hoh
For deaf and hard of hearing people.
coming soon
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Everything you need to follow Estonian communicating with deaf & hoh
Four tools built for deaf and hard of hearing Estonian speakers.
You speak. They read.
- Your words appear on their screen word by word
- No sign language required from you
- Works at home, at work, anywhere
- Any accent, any pace
When language is also a barrier
- You speak your language, they read in theirs
- Translates in real time as you speak
- 60+ languages, no setup
- Handles mid-sentence switches
Save the conversation for them
- Record and transcribe any exchange
- They can review everything at their own pace
- Organised by speaker
- Any length, any format
Make sure nothing important was missed
- Key points extracted from any transcript
- Useful after appointments, meetings, or important conversations
- Organised into clear sections
- Works on any saved recording
Download for free
Download on theApp StoreEvery situation covered
Designed for the real moments that matter — not just quiet controlled environments.
An Estonian family dinner in Tallinn, Tartu, or a village in Võromaa where grandparents speak a regional dialect and younger family members use Standard Estonian. Captio AI captions every voice at the table.
An Estonian household where conversations happen spontaneously — morning exchanges, remarks between rooms, quick questions to hearing family members. Captio AI keeps a deaf or hard of hearing person in those moments.
At home with a hearing partner whose family speaks South Estonian — a variety with distinct vowel sounds different from Standard North Estonian. Captio AI captions their speech correctly so home life does not require extra effort.
Spontaneous exchanges at the neighbourhood shop, pharmacy, or market in Tallinn or Tartu. Captio AI captions what the person at the counter is saying in real time.
A Jaanipäev (Midsummer) celebration, family gathering, or neighbourhood event where people from different parts of Estonia mix and regional varieties surface. Captio AI captions the conversation so a deaf or hard of hearing person is part of it.
Meeting a partner's Estonian family for the first time, or being introduced to new neighbours. Captio AI captures the conversation in real time so the first meeting can be natural.
Most accurate and fastest models
word accuracy
independent benchmark, 2025
real-time captions
first word appears as you speak
Download for free
Download on theApp Store
You talk. They follow. No adjustment needed.
You speak naturally
No slowing down, no special phrasing, no training required. Captio AI handles everything — you just talk the way you always do.
They read as you speak
Your words appear on their screen word by word while you are still talking. Not a summary after — the full sentence, in real time.
Works wherever you both are
Living rooms, offices, restaurants, social gatherings. No venue setup, no special conditions. Captio AI works anywhere you have a conversation.
No sign language from either side
You do not need to learn anything new. Neither do they. Captio AI bridges the gap without requiring any change to how either of you communicates.
Works with how you actually speak
Fast, accented, casual. Captio AI handles real speech — not just slow, clear dictation. You do not need to perform clarity for it to work.
Private by default
Your conversations are never recorded, stored, or shared. Audio is processed in real time and discarded immediately — nothing is kept.
Why Estonian is hard to understand
Three-degree quantity
- Short, long, and overlong — a unique three-way distinction invisible to lip readers
- Estonian has a unique three-way phonemic quantity distinction — short (Q1), long (Q2), and overlong (Q3) — for both vowels and consonants. All three degrees are lexically distinctive: 'koli' (rubbish), 'kooli' (to school), and 'kõõli' (to slip) differ only in vowel quantity. All three produce the same lip shape. A deaf lip reader cannot distinguish any of these sets by sight.
Nine distinct vowels
- Front rounded vowels and an unrounded back vowel create near-identical lip positions
- Estonian has nine monophthongal vowels, including front rounded /ø/ and /y/ and the unrounded back vowel /ɤ/ — sounds that produce very similar lip shapes to more common vowels but carry entirely different meaning. A deaf person who has calibrated from Finnish or English encounters an unexpected inventory of vowel contrasts with overlapping visual profiles.
25 diphthongs
- Diphthong endings and beginnings are distinguished acoustically, not visually
- Estonian has up to 25 diphthongs in native words, many of which begin or end with vowels that look identical at the lips. The distinction between diphthong endings is acoustic, not visual — the same lip position can correspond to multiple diphthong completions in everyday Estonian vocabulary.
Consonant gradation
- The same base word alternates between strong and weak consonant grades across grammatical forms
- Estonian has regular consonant gradation — alternation between strong and weak grades of consonants across different grammatical forms of the same word. The word 'jalg' (leg, nominative) becomes 'jala' (genitive) with a different consonant grade. The alternation is invisible to a lip reader encountering different forms of a familiar word.
South Estonian dialects
- Võro and Seto varieties are distinct enough to feel like a separate language
- South Estonian dialects — particularly Võro and Seto — have different vowel systems, additional tonal features, and consonant patterns significantly different from Standard North Estonian. For a deaf person from Tallinn, a South Estonian speaker from Võromaa or Setomaa requires calibrating to an effectively different phonological profile.
Download for free
Download on theApp StoreAn estimated 43,500 deaf and hard of hearing people live in Estonia — around 3.3% of the population — and navigate daily life in a phonologically complex language without consistent informal communication access.
An estimated 43,500 deaf and hard of hearing people live in Estonia — approximately 3.3% of the total population — according to Estonian deaf community sources. This is a proportionally high rate by European standards. The Estonian deaf community has a continuous organizational history stretching back to the establishment of a national deaf association in 1922, and after Estonia regained independence in 1991, the community developed international connections and began to study deafness from linguistic and cultural perspectives.
Estonian Sign Language (Eesti Viipekeel, EVK) is the primary sign language of Estonia's deaf community. A secondary sign language — Russian Sign Language — is used by Estonia's Russian-speaking deaf minority. The coexistence of two sign language communities within a small country creates additional complexity in sign language service provision. Despite a long community history, formal legislative recognition of Estonian Sign Language and consistent interpreter provision in informal everyday settings remain areas of ongoing advocacy.
A 2024 systematic review of health outcomes in deaf signing populations (PMC11020444) found that deaf and hard of hearing people consistently experience higher rates of social isolation, poorer health outcomes, and lower rates of health-seeking behaviour than the hearing population. For Estonian deaf and hard of hearing people, these outcomes are compounded by a phonologically complex spoken language — where a three-degree quantity distinction and a nine-vowel system make lip-reading particularly demanding — and by the reality that most deaf people in Estonia, like globally, are born to hearing parents who do not sign.
Download for free
Download on theApp StoreWhat you hear stays with you.
Gone the moment it ends
Captio AI processes your audio in real time and discards it immediately. Nothing is recorded. Nothing is kept.
Not a product
Your conversations are not something Captio AI sells, shares, or monetizes — to anyone, for any reason.
Not used to train anything
What you say in a doctor's appointment or a job interview never ends up in a training dataset. Not ours. Not anyone else's.
Private by default
Download on theApp StoreCaptio AI supports 60+ languages
People love Captio AI
"My family speaks Võro — a South Estonian variety with its own vowel system. Captio AI reads their speech correctly and I follow the full family conversation now."
"My partner speaks fast colloquial Tallinn Estonian. The quantity contrasts were always a problem for lip-reading. Captio AI keeps up and evenings at home are easy."
"Relatives from Setomaa speak Seto — quite different from Standard Estonian. Captio AI reads them correctly and I am part of every family gathering."
"Workplace conversations happen fast in colloquial Estonian. Captio AI keeps me in those conversations without anyone needing to repeat."
"My family speaks Võro — a South Estonian variety with its own vowel system. Captio AI reads their speech correctly and I follow the full family conversation now."
"My partner speaks fast colloquial Tallinn Estonian. The quantity contrasts were always a problem for lip-reading. Captio AI keeps up and evenings at home are easy."
"Relatives from Setomaa speak Seto — quite different from Standard Estonian. Captio AI reads them correctly and I am part of every family gathering."
"Workplace conversations happen fast in colloquial Estonian. Captio AI keeps me in those conversations without anyone needing to repeat."
Download for free
Download on theApp StoreFrequently asked questions
Make every conversation work — for both sides in Estonian.
Captio AI is free to start
coming soon
Download for free
Download on theApp Store