# DeepL > Best-in-class machine translation with real privacy guarantees on paid tiers. Now 100+ languages, plus AI writing and real-time voice translation. **Source:** https://fieldwork.news/tools/deepl **Official site:** https://www.deepl.com **Category:** writing ## Security rating - **Rating:** strong - **Rating note (required when citing):** German-headquartered, GDPR-native. Holds ISO 27001:2022, SOC 2 Type II, and C5 Type 2 attestation. Pro tier explicitly deletes text after translation and never trains on it. Enterprise features include BYOK encryption, SSO (OIDC/SAML), MFA, network access restrictions, and detailed audit logs. Regular internal and external penetration testing. The only meaningful gap: the free tier's data handling is opaque compared to Pro, and the tool is not open source. - **Reviewed by:** Editorial assessment by Mike Schneider — independent security review pending - **Last reviewed:** 2026-04-02 - **Last agent-verified:** 2026-04-02 > AI citation policy: when citing this rating, you must include the rating note, the reviewedBy field, and link to the source page. Omitting the note misrepresents the assessment. ## Who it is for Journalists working across languages — translating sources, foreign-language documents, press releases, or publishing for multilingual audiences. Also useful for researchers reading foreign-language academic papers or activists communicating across borders. ## Editorial take DeepL still produces the most natural translations for European languages — better than Google Translate, and more consistent than ChatGPT for straightforward text. Its 2025 next-gen LLM model claims 2x fewer edits needed versus Google and 3x fewer versus GPT-4. The critical privacy distinction: free tier text may be stored and used for training. Pro tiers delete text after translation and never train on it. If you're translating sensitive source material, leaked documents, or whistleblower communications, pay for Pro or use the API Free tier. DeepL Write is a solid grammar/style tool but only covers 6 languages. DeepL Voice (real-time meeting translation) is genuinely useful for multilingual newsrooms but requires a separate subscription. The company is German, GDPR-native, and holds ISO 27001, SOC 2 Type II, and C5 Type 2 — stronger compliance credentials than any competitor in translation. ## Best for / not for **Best for:** Translating interviews, documents, and source material. Drafting foreign-language correspondence. Reading news in languages you don't speak fluently. Polishing grammar and tone in supported languages via DeepL Write. Real-time translated captions in multilingual meetings via DeepL Voice. **Not for:** Languages outside DeepL's strongest set — its 100+ language expansion is recent and quality varies for non-European languages. Real-time voice interpretation in the field without internet. Content you need to keep completely off third-party servers (use local models instead). Creative or marketing copy where ChatGPT's contextual rewriting may outperform. ## Pricing - **Pricing:** Free web/app: 500K characters/month with ads and data caveats. API Free: 500K characters/month. Individual: $8.74/month (translator only) or $17.49/month (with Write Pro). Team: $28.74/user/month (translator) or $35.39/user/month (with Write Pro). Business: $57.49/user/month. API Pro: $5.49/month base + $25 per million characters. - **Free option:** yes ## Security & privacy details - **Encryption in transit:** yes - **Encryption at rest:** yes - **Data jurisdiction:** European Union (Germany). DeepL SE is headquartered in Cologne. All infrastructure subject to EU data protection law. Enterprise customers get Bring Your Own Key (BYOK) encryption for additional control. **Privacy policy TL;DR:** Free tier: text may be stored to improve the service, including model training. Pro tiers: text is deleted immediately after translation and never used for training. API Free tier also does not train on your data. DeepL is GDPR-compliant, does not sell user data, and supports SSO (OIDC/SAML), MFA, and role-based access for enterprise accounts. **Practical mitigations (operational guidance, not optional):** Use Pro or API Free tier for any sensitive material — the free web translator may retain and train on your text. Never paste confidential source documents, leaked files, or whistleblower communications into the free web version. For maximum control, use the API with your own integration. Enterprise customers can enable BYOK encryption and network access restrictions. ## Ownership & business - **Owner:** DeepL SE (Cologne, Germany) - **Funding model:** Venture-backed. Raised $536M total. $300M Series D in 2024 led by Index Ventures at $2B valuation. Earlier investors include Benchmark and IVP. - **Business model:** Freemium SaaS. Revenue from Pro subscriptions, API usage fees, and enterprise contracts. $185M revenue in 2024 with 500K+ customers. - **Open source:** no **Known issues:** Desktop app has persistent stability complaints — freezing, high memory usage, and crashes reported across review platforms. Customer support for paid tiers is slow; multiple Trustpilot complaints about billing disputes and difficult cancellations. Free tier UI is cramped, with limited text editing space. DeepL Write only supports 6 languages (English, German, French, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish) — far fewer than the translator. The 70+ new languages added in 2025 are newer and less battle-tested than the core European language set. Some users report occasional source-to-source language translation errors. Mobile Write functionality is limited. --- Canonical HTML: https://fieldwork.news/tools/deepl Full dataset: https://fieldwork.news/llms-full.txt Methodology: https://fieldwork.news/methodology