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K’iche’ Interpreters

Professional K’iche’ interpreting, virtual or in person, for the settings where getting it wrong has consequences — asylum interviews, hearings, attorney meetings, medical appointments and school meetings.

K’iche’ is the largest Mayan language, and still not one a Spanish interpreter covers

Can a Spanish interpreter cover a K’iche’ speaker? Not reliably: K’iche’ is a Mayan language with no relation to Spanish, and for many speakers Spanish is a second language learned late, partially or not at all. It is the biggest of Guatemala’s Mayan languages — the 2018 census counted 1,680,551 people who identify with the K’iche’ community and 1,054,818 who learned K’iche’ as their first language — and its speakers have been a steady presence in US immigration court, where “Quiche” was the twelfth most common language of completed cases in each of fiscal 2015, 2016 and 2017.

Size has not made it easy to staff. NPR reported in 2014 that when no interpreter could be found, officials sometimes fell back on an Indigenous child’s limited Spanish, and The New York Times reported in 2019 that courts relied on private contractors and telephone interpreters for Mayan languages, with hearings postponed for want of one. TRAC adds that Indigenous-language speakers are probably undercounted in court records because they are recorded as Spanish speakers. If the client grew up speaking K’iche’, book K’iche’ even when they say their Spanish is fine — testimony is not the place to find out it was not.

Born in Quiché does not mean K’iche’-speaking

“Quiché” is two things: the older spelling of the language and the name of a Guatemalan department. A form that says Quiché may be recording where someone was born. In the 2018 census, of the department of Quiché’s 850,655 residents aged four and over, 474,772 learned K’iche’ first — and 109,809 learned Ixil, 65,747 Q’eqchi’, 17,086 Poqomchi’ and 9,527 Q’anjob’al, with smaller numbers of Sakapulteko and Uspanteko speakers. Each of those is a separate language.

K’iche’ is also spoken well beyond that department: the census counted 269,545 first-language speakers in Totonicapán, 148,341 in Sololá and 62,266 in Quetzaltenango. So the useful question is not which department the client is from but which language their parents spoke to them, and in which municipality.

Dialects by town, and Achi, which its speakers call a separate language

Until 2009 the international language-code standard listed six K’iche’ “languages” — Central, West Central, Eastern, Cunén, Joyabaj and San Andrés Quiché. They were merged into one code at the request of Mayanist Nora England, on the ground that these are dialects of one language. That is the linguists’ consensus, and it still means real variation by town: tell us the municipality, and a speaker from Joyabaj or Cunén can be matched to an interpreter who knows the variety.

Achi, spoken mainly in Baja Verapaz, is the exception worth knowing. England’s request notes that most linguists consider it a dialect group of K’iche’, but its speakers have overwhelmingly chosen to identify it as a separate language, and Guatemala’s census counts it separately (160,858 people identify as Achi). Court records list it separately too: TRAC’s 2021 data shows “Cubulco Achi” alongside “Quiche”. Book what the client calls their language, and tell us if it is Achi so we can say honestly whether a K’iche’ interpreter is a sound choice for that person.

K’iche’, Quiché, Kiché: same language, and court files use the oldest spelling

The apostrophes in K’iche’ belong to the Mayan spelling that, as England’s request notes, speakers of Guatemala’s Mayan languages broadly agree on; the international code standard keeps Quiché as an alternative name, and immigration court records still write “Quiche”. A booking that comes in under any of these is the same language.

Many interpreters of Mayan languages work between their language and Spanish rather than English, so a session may run as a relay — English to Spanish and Spanish to K’iche’ — with two interpreters, each billed per hour, and each exchange taking about twice as long. Whether we can staff a direct K’iche’–English interpreter or need a relay depends on the variety and the date, and we confirm which before you book.

K’iche’ is a rare language

Only a handful of qualified K’iche’ interpreters work in the United States — we found five or fewer across state court rosters, professional directories and freelance platforms — and courts and hospitals book them first. That is why K’iche’ carries the rare-language rate, 75% on top of the base: $140 an hour by video or phone with a one-hour minimum, and $192.50 an hour in person with a two-hour minimum, plus travel. Give us as much notice as you can: two weeks is comfortable, a few days often is not enough.

We would rather tell you that before you book a hearing date than after. If your date is fixed and close, say so when you enquire and we will tell you honestly whether we can staff it rather than accepting and hoping.

The standard-availability languages are: Spanish, Portuguese, French, Mandarin, Cantonese, Arabic, Russian, Korean, Vietnamese, Haitian Creole, Polish, Italian, German, Japanese, Hindi, Urdu, Persian, Turkish, Ukrainian, Tagalog, Bengali, Punjabi, Gujarati, Tamil, Armenian, Greek, Hebrew, Romanian, Serbian, Bosnian, Somali and Nepali. Every other language we offer carries the 25–30% limited-availability rate, except the rare languages — Mam, K’iche’, Q’anjob’al, Tzotzil, Mixtec, Fuzhounese, Hakka, Hakha Chin, Kachin, Balochi, Bambara, Soninke, Tigre, Chaldean Neo-Aramaic and Assyrian Neo-Aramaic — which carry 75%. If a language is not on the standard list it is not because we cannot do it — it is because the pool of qualified interpreters in the United States is small enough that we will not promise a date without checking.

By video, by phone or in person

Virtual interpreting runs on Zoom, Google Meet or Microsoft Teams, or over the telephone. It is quicker to arrange, costs less and carries no travel charge, and it suits appointments, calls and most meetings.

In person is what venues with their own rules tend to expect, and the right choice when documents are being signed or several people are speaking at once. Tell us the platform, or the city and the venue, when you send the request.

Where interpretation is used

The settings differ in what they demand of the interpreter, which is worth saying because they are frequently priced as though they were the same work:

• Asylum and immigration interviews. USCIS asylum interviews require the applicant to bring an interpreter, and the interview can be rescheduled if the interpreter does not appear or is not competent — which makes this the setting where getting it right matters most.
• Attorney–client meetings and declarations. Preparing testimony, taking a statement, going through documents.
• Depositions and hearings. Where the record is being made and accuracy is examined afterwards.
• Medical appointments. Note that hospitals receiving federal funding generally must provide language assistance themselves, so ask before you hire.
• School meetings. IEP meetings and parent conferences — districts also have their own obligations here.
• Business meetings and signings, such as real estate closings.

Each setting has its own page — who has to provide the interpreter, what the meeting asks of one and what it costs: see interpreters by setting.

What it costs

Rates are per interpreter, per hour, and billed from the scheduled start time rather than from when everyone actually arrives.

• Virtual — $80 per hour, one-hour minimum. Zoom, Google Meet, Teams or telephone.
• In person — $110 per hour, two-hour minimum.
• Limited-availability languages — add 25–30%. Which languages those are is listed below rather than left vague.
• Rare languages — add 75%: $140 per hour virtual and $192.50 per hour in person. These are the languages with only a handful of qualified interpreters in the United States, listed below.
• Travel for in-person work — $0.70 per mile from the interpreter's location.

How the travel charge works out

Travel is charged at $0.70 per mile from the interpreter's location, which means you can work it out rather than wait for a quote: a 20-mile round trip is $14, a 60-mile round trip is $42, a 150-mile round trip is $105. There is no separate call-out fee on top.

We will not pretend to know in advance where the interpreter will be coming from — that depends on the language, the date and the venue. What we do is confirm the interpreter and the exact travel figure before you book, so it is never a surprise on the invoice. Virtual assignments carry no travel charge at all, which is one reason most of what we do is virtual.

How booking an interpreter works

• You send the request with the form below: the language, the setting, the format, the date and how long it should last.
• We confirm before you commit: the interpreter, the exact price and the travel figure if there is one. We reply within minutes, four business hours at most, and no payment is taken at this stage.
• You confirm, and the interpreter is booked for your date.

What we will tell you before you book

Two things, both of which occasionally cost us the booking. Whether the venue supplies its own interpreter. Immigration court provides one. Hospitals receiving federal funding generally must provide language assistance. School districts have obligations of their own. If yours does, you should not be paying us — ask them first.

And whether we can actually staff your date. For a limited-availability or rare language on short notice the honest answer is sometimes no, and we would rather say it than accept a booking we cannot fill. Interpretation is not translation: see certified translation at $24.95 per page if what you need is a document rendered in writing.

What to have ready

The more of this comes in the first message, the fewer exchanges before you have a price:

• The language, the date, the start time and how long it should run.
• Virtual or in person: the platform, or the city and the venue.
• The setting and the subject matter.
• How many people need interpreting for.
• Any credential the venue requires of the interpreter.

Request an interpreter

Tell us the date, the language and the setting and we will come back with the interpreter, the exact price and the travel figure if there is one — before you commit to anything.

Sources

The facts on this page about the language and its speakers in the United States were checked against these sources on October 28, 2026.

• Instituto Nacional de Estadística Guatemala — Censo 2018, tables 06 and 07 (Maya linguistic community; language first learned, by department)
• U.S. Department of Justice, EOIR — Statistics Yearbook FY 2017, Table 9: initial case completions by top 25 languages (2018)
• TRAC, Syracuse University — 40 Languages Spoken Among Asylum Seekers with Pending MPP Cases (2021)
• SIL / ISO 639-3 Registration Authority — Change request 2008-054 (Nora England), merging K’iche’ codes (adopted 2009)
• NPR Code Switch — Language Barriers Pose Challenges for Mayan Migrant Children (2014)
• The New York Times (Jennifer Medina), via WRAL — Anyone Speak K’iche’ or Mam? Immigration Courts Overwhelmed by Indigenous Languages (2019)

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