Latvian Language: Facts for Translators

Latvian (lv, lav) is a world language. Wikidata records about 1.5M speakers. It is written in Latvian alphabet. It is an official language in 1 country, including Latvia.

Expect text translated from English into Latvian to grow by roughly 15–30%, which matters for layouts, subtitles and page counts.

1.5M

Speakers

+15…+30%

Text length vs English

$0.07–0.15

Indicative rate / word

Where Latvian is official

Latvia

Rates for Latvian translation

Latvian falls in our central & eastern european band: roughly $0.07–$0.15 per word for general commercial work. These are indicative ranges, not quotes — specialised, certified and rush work costs more, and literary translation is usually priced per 1,000 words.

For context, the median salaried translator or interpreter in the US earned $60,170 in May 2025 (BLS). See salaries by state →

Translation cost calculatorEstimate a quote by language, word count, subject and deadline.

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From Wikipedia

Latvian, also known as Lettish, is an East Baltic language belonging to the Indo-European language family. It is spoken in the Baltic region, and is the language of the Latvians. It is the official language of Latvia as well as one of the official languages of the European Union. There are about 1.5 million native Latvian speakers in Latvia and 100,000 abroad. Of those, around 1.16 million or 62% of Latvia's population used it as their primary language at home, though excluding the Latgale and Riga regions it is spoken as a native language in villages and towns by over 90% of the population.