Translation Tools Vs Human Translators: What’s Best?

Over the past couple of years, a lot has changed in the website and app translation industry. While a couple of new tools and techniques have been introduced, what’s mainly changed is how easy it has become to get your app or website localized. Localization refers to more than just the language being in the native tongue; it also refers to other aspects of the content, such as design elements, that are tailored to the region in question in order to maximize outreach efforts. 

The biggest advantage a business can have is a website that’s available in the local language. Not only does that give the business access to a huge global market, but it can also help many businesses grow in otherwise challenging industries.

If you are considering getting your website or app translated to sell more items easily in your local market and to sell goods or services to foreign corporations or foreign customers, there are a couple of things you should be aware of, which we’ll discuss in this article. 

Take into consideration that to reach a whole new audience of online shoppers, app users, and web browsers, your business needs to be translated into their mother tongue, no matter where in the world they are based.

The Global Translation Marketplace 

Global translation marketplace services are the type of high-quality translations that are only offered by qualified human translators. Global translation marketplaces are offered in the most popular languages to help a business communicate with a global audience without any language barriers.

Thanks to the internet over the past couple of years, it has become increasingly easier to hire professional translators from halfway across the world to translate your website. For instance, you can hire a Greek software engineer and translator in Greece who will translate your business app to Greek in an accurate way. The advantage of hiring such a professional is that they are not only familiar with software development but are also native speakers. Some experienced translators will also give you pointers on how to further localize your business app for their market. 

The Evolution of Machine Translation

The advantages of machine translation on the market are well established nowadays. As artificial intelligence is developing at such a rapid pace, there have been constant updates on the technology in the last few decades. It delivers translations faster but not more effectively than human translators because, under the hand of machine translation, the quality and missing interpretation suffer.

Improved Translation Tools 

Online translation services like Google Translate, BabelFish, Bitbucket, and others have improved with AI to the extent that they do a good job for simple translations. BabelFish recently introduced several premium tools that do a good job of translating text on the fly in multiple languages, but only for simple phrases and sentences, as it can struggle with translating more complex sentences accurately. Now – the translation of apps or websites precisely must be carried out by a person who is knowledgeable about software development and how to use the corresponding software.  

Mobile Translation Tools 

Many mobile-based tools for Android and iOS do a pretty good job at translating website content, voice conversations, and even subtitles for movies. However, they may not help with translating apps from Japanese to English or vice versa. That said, these tools are improving almost every year to the point where they are now surprisingly good but still not a replacement for a human translator. 

Disadvantage: Online translation tools can only translate automatically and mechanically, which means that they are designed to translate but not to interpret. That’s why you should not rely on them to translate your business content, including websites.

Translation Agencies 

Your best bet to get any app or website translated and localized is still a translation agency. Translation agencies employ not only native speakers and writers in various languages but also have a lot of experience translating all types of content. 

The team at Ya-Hub Translations will also be able to ensure that not only is your content accurately translated, but that it is done by an expert and native translator. Additionally, a hierarchy of people edits and verifies the content to make sure it is flawless and even culturally appropriate.