Case study · Media
RTL Lëtzebuerg: from one language to four, on the same day.
RTL Lëtzebuerg uses DeepTranslate to subtitle De Journal, its flagship daily news, in Luxembourgish, French, German and English, published on RTL Play the same day. Before, the programme had no subtitles at all. Italian and Portuguese are now in pilot.
Last updated 19 October 2026
What changed for RTL Lëtzebuerg?
0 → 4
subtitle languages on every episode: LB, FR, DE, EN
Same day
from broadcast to subtitled episode on RTL Play
+2
languages in pilot at RTL's request: Italian and Portuguese
Days
to integrate into RTL's production workflow
Luxembourg in numbers
A small country with a large multilingual audience. Most of it could not follow the flagship news.
337,600
people reached by RTL every day across TV, radio and online
79.9%
of residents reached by RTL every week
46.6%
of residents are not Luxembourgish
Sources: IP Luxembourg / ILRES, TRAIL 2026-I; STATEC, population on 1 January 2026; STATEC, Census 2021, linguistic diversity; STATEC, Luxembourg in Figures 2025.
Why did RTL need subtitles in four languages?
Luxembourg runs on several languages. Nearly half of its residents are not Luxembourgish, yet De Journal aired only in Luxembourgish, without subtitles.
No vendor or in-house team could subtitle a daily news programme into four languages by hand. Manual subtitling takes days per language, and the news is old by then.
Generic engines were no answer either. They handle Luxembourgish poorly, and a wrong subtitle on the news is worse than none.
How does the workflow at RTL work?
- 01
Learn the workflow
We mapped how De Journal is produced and where subtitles fit before writing a line of code.
- 02
Build the glossaries
One glossary per language pair, built from RTL's own files: names, places, institutions, programme terms.
- 03
Add a QA agent for Luxembourgish
Every segment is scored against the source. Weak segments go back through the engine before anyone sees them.
- 04
Keep editors in the loop
RTL's editors review the output and their fixes flow back into the engine and the glossaries.
- 05
Publish automatically
Subtitles land in RTL's workflow and go out on RTL Play the same day as the broadcast.
Timeline
- Spring 2026
Pilot starts
Glossaries, QA agent and first episodes in French, German and English.
- Summer 2026
Daily production
Four subtitle languages on every episode of De Journal.
- July 2026
Portuguese added
RTL adds Portuguese for the large share of its audience that speaks it at home.
- Now
Italian in pilot
Italian and Portuguese run in pilot alongside the four live languages.
What is next for RTL?
Moving Italian and Portuguese from pilot into daily production.
Real-time caption translation, so live programmes can be followed in other languages while they air. This is in development.
Frequently asked questions
How does RTL Lëtzebuerg use DeepTranslate?
RTL Lëtzebuerg uses DeepTranslate to subtitle De Journal, its flagship daily news, in Luxembourgish, French, German and English on the day of broadcast. Italian and Portuguese are in pilot.
How long did integration take?
Days, according to David Gloesener, Head of Platforms and Products at RTL Lëtzebuerg.