# SignGemma

ASL (American Sign Language) → English translation model. Announced at Google I/O 2025.

## Status

**Limited preview only. No open weights as of April 2026.** Google published an interest form at I/O 2025; access has been gated to language-service providers, accessibility researchers, and members of the Deaf community. Participants receive a TensorFlow Lite package and sample integration code.

There is no public Hugging Face entry under `google/signgemma*`. The original plan was general availability by end-of-2025, which slipped. No updated timeline announced as of April 2026.

## What it is (from announcement material)

- **Video-in, text-out** on-device model.
- Best performance on **ASL → English**; training includes other sign languages for future expansion.
- Uses a **vision transformer** to analyze hand shapes, facial expressions, and motion, followed by a compact language model that produces English output.
- Sized for **smartphones and laptops** — on-device real-time translation is the design goal.

## Base generation

Google states it is "part of the Gemma family" and "built on the Gemini Nano framework." Likely Gemma 3-era image/video encoder on a small Gemma 3 text decoder — **not confirmed**, and the "Gemini Nano framework" language suggests it may use Gemini-not-Gemma internals despite the name. Verify at release.

## Model card

- LinkedIn announcement: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/googledeepmind_signgemma-is-our-most-advanced-model-for-activity-7342957078249955329-JwJJ
- Slator coverage: https://slator.com/google-invites-feedback-for-signgemma-a-new-ai-sign-language-translation-model/

No public model card yet.

## Prompt format

Not published.

## Minimum invocation

Not possible. No weights available.

## When to choose it

On release: accessibility apps, live captioning for Deaf users, sign-language learning tools.

## Homelab fit

Zero for typical homelab use. If Seth ever wants to pilot a real-time captioning overlay for video streams this could matter — but not buildable until Google ships weights.
