Disney+ Gets A Massive Global Update: 17 New Languages & New Interface
Disney has announced some major changes to its streaming service by revealing that it’s rolling out support for 17 additional languages, bringing the total to 58 audio languages supported.
Across the platform, the Disney+ user interface is now available in more than 30 languages, with subtitles and closed captions offered in as many as 42. As part of this new expansion, it introduces support for languages including Arabic, Croatian, Hebrew, Thai, Indonesian, Malay, Hindi, Tamil, and Telugu — including UI, audio, and timed text — depending on the language.
To go along with this, a new right-to-left interface for Disney+ has been added, which has been designed for languages such as Arabic and Hebrew, bringing a more natural, intuitive viewing experience to millions of viewers.
Viewers interested in changing the language of their audio, subtitles, or closed captions can do so by pausing a title during playback and selecting the Audio & Subtitles menu. The app language can be changed by tapping the profile icon (or hovering over it on the web), selecting Edit Profiles, choosing a profile by tapping the pencil icon, and then selecting App Language.
This move is being done to make Disney+ more accessible and localised than ever before. These updates support a more inclusive and intuitive streaming experience for our subscribers around the world.
Roger’s Take: Recently international fans have been noticing that more language options have been added to Disney+ in recent months, but it’s great to see that this is all part of a bigger plan to add more language options to Disney+, but I suspect this has been done because Disney is looking to simplify its app across the globe, as a different version of the Disney+ app known as Hotstar X, was introduced a few years ago in many countries like Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, and South Africa.
But after Disney entered into a partnership with Reliance, which saw Disney+ Hotstar rebrand to JioHotstar in India, it seemed likely that Disney would try to make a single app globally, since it would be much cheaper for them to update a single platform, especially once Hulu is fully incorporated into Disney+ in the United States later this year.
Disney hasn’t yet confirmed whether the Hotstar X version of Disney+ will eventually be replaced by the main version used in the United States, but these changes suggest it will happen at some point. Hopefully, Disney will provide an update to subscribers in impacted countries soon.
The rollout of more languages on Disney+ is also going to benefit people around the world who speak those languages and, just as importantly, make travelling with Disney+ even easier, plus just making it a better global experience.
What do you think of this expansion of languages? Let me know on social media!
