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Twi Interpreters

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

Twi is one form of Akan, and Fante is another

Is Twi the same as Akan? Twi is the largest part of it: linguists use "Akan" for the Fante and Twi dialects of southern Ghana, and the Census Bureau's language list codes Akan as a macrolanguage with Fanti and Twi entered separately beneath it. Within Twi, the descriptive literature has long distinguished Asante and Akuapem, alongside Fante — a classic phonology of Akan is subtitled exactly that.

The varieties grew separate written traditions, which is why a Unified Akan Orthography was proposed by Ghana's Bureau of Ghana Languages in 1978 and why its fit to spoken Fante was still being studied a decade later. For a booking that means two things: ask the client whether they speak Asante Twi, Akuapem Twi or Fante, and expect a letter or church document from home to follow one variety's spelling rather than a single standard.

Many Ghanaians list Twi because it is the common language, not their first

The University of Pennsylvania's African Studies Center puts Twi speakers, native and non-native, at about 85% of Ghana's population, but native Twi speakers at about 45% (and Akan speakers in general at about 60%). The gap is the people who use Twi at work and at the market and speak another language at home.

So "Twi" on an intake form deserves one question. The Census Bureau codes Ga, Adangme, Ewe, Nzema, Dagbani and many other Ghanaian languages separately — and keeps a "Ghana N.E.C." code for people who write in only the country. An Ewe or Ga speaker may be comfortable in Twi for a medical appointment and not for an asylum declaration; for testimony, book the first language if the person prefers it.

Most Twi speakers in the US also speak English; the need shows up in courts and testimony

In the 2024 American Community Survey, 773,238 people spoke "Yoruba, Twi, Igbo, or other languages of Western Africa" at home and 81% of them said they speak English very well. Twi interpreting is therefore requested less for everyday matters than for elderly relatives, recent arrivals and situations — a deposition, a psychiatric evaluation, a criminal matter — where functional English is not enough.

Some state courts already staff the language. The Massachusetts Trial Court's Office of Language Access lists Twi among the languages its staff and per-diem interpreters cover across roughly 140 court divisions. If your matter is in a court like that, the court provides the interpreter; we are the right call for the attorney meetings, depositions and appointments around it.

Twi is a limited-availability language

There are comparatively few qualified Twi interpreters working in the United States, and the ones there are get booked. That is why Twi carries the 25–30% limited-availability rate, and why lead time matters more here than with a common language: a week is comfortable, two days is a gamble.

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. If a language is not on that 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.
• 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 the same business day, 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 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.

• University of Pennsylvania, Penn Language Center — Twi
• Adjaye — Fante: the orthography versus speech, Journal of the International Phonetic Association 15(2) (1989)
• Glottolog — Akan
• US Census Bureau — American Community Survey language code list
• Census Reporter — US Census Bureau ACS 2024 1-year, table B16001, Language spoken at home by ability to speak English (United States)
• Massachusetts Trial Court — Facts about the Office of Language Access (archived December 31, 2024)

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