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Sonico launches iTranslate for Mac with voice output, dictionaries, 80+ languages and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ July 10, 2014

German developer Sonico Mobile makes some fairly nice translation apps for the iPhone. Their excellent iTranslate app, available free for the iPhone and iPad, allows you to translate words and text into over 80 languages.

It supports voice input and output for most language pairs, which works much better than you'd think in terms of dialects, gender, speaking rate and other variables affecting translation accuracy.

Sonico is now bringing that same experience to your Mac with the launch of the native iTranslate for Mac app, a free download from the Mac App Store. With over 80 languages supported out of the box and features like voice output, fast text input, romanization and built-in dictionaries, Sonico's software enables the App Store's most popular translator tool on your Mac...

Microsoft demos real-time voice translation feature for Skype

Cody Lee ∙ Updated January 2, 2017

Last night at Recode's inaugural Code Conference, Microsoft announced a new real-time voice translation feature for its Skype VoIP service. The company says it's currently in beta form, but it plans to eventually roll it out to all devices.

The goal of the feature is to allow users to hold a conversation with someone speaking a foreign language, with Skype providing near-instant voice translations for both parties. And judging by the initial demonstration, it works fairly well...

Google buys visual translation app Word Lens

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated January 27, 2018

Google has just purchased Quest Visual for an undisclosed price. The startup is behind the innovative Word Lens application which Apple recently highlighted in its 'Powerful' Phone 5s ad. The deal was confirmed in the startup's blog post.

The team has decided to make both the Word Lens app and the additional language packs free to download for a limited time, "while we transition to Google". If you haven't tried out Word Lens yet, you should do so right now, while it's still available.

The remarkable software taps Quest Visual's technology to detect text in a live video feed coming from your iPhone's camera. It then replaces foreign language words and sentences with an appropriate translation - matching fonts and graphics, in real time!

Metaphrase: a quick way to translate text in iOS

Jeff Benjamin ∙ March 18, 2014

Metaphrase is a recently released tweak that lets you translate text on the fly within any application in iOS. The release, which works as an add-on to Ryan Petrich's popular ActionMenu tweak, lets you select text from the copy and paste menu to easily translate words from one language to another.

There are dozens of languages available to use in Metaphrase, and you can choose to have it translate words and phrases using the system language established in iOS' settings. For a video look into how Metaphrase works, check out our full walkthrough inside.

Google Translate updated with iOS 7 keyboard, support for more languages

Cody Lee ∙ Updated January 24, 2016

Google posted an update for its popular Translate iOS client today, bringing the app to version 2.1. The update includes various UI improvements, including the new iOS 7 keyboard and status bar, as well as support for new languages.

The new keyboard is great, as it brings the app in line with other iOS 7 apps, and the same goes for the transparent status bar. And as for the additional handwriting languages support, it includes Arabic, Hebrew, Maltese, and more...

Facebook acquires speech recognition firm Mobile Technologies

Cody Lee ∙ Updated January 23, 2018

Facebook has announced this afternoon that it has acquired Mobile Technologies, a private company that develops speech recognition and machine translation technology. The move reiterates the social network's commitment to its mobile strategy.

Honestly, I hadn't heard of the company before today. But some quick digging shows that Mobile Technologies is behind the popular Jibbigo translation app, which the developers claim is the "world’s first" online/offline speech-to-speech translator...

Review: iTranslate Voice, the best and funniest voice-to-voice iPhone translator

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated February 19, 2018

German developer Sonico Mobile's iTranslate Voice (not to be confused with dozens of App Store apps that have 'itranslate' in their name) has been on the App Store since May 2012, scoring rave reviews and winning the attention of App Store editors who featured the software on multiple occasions.

A little over a year since its debut they totally revamped the app, adding new languages and language facts and an incredible device-to-device AirTranslate feature.

Unlike many other apps that claim to feature quick voice-to-voice translations, iVoice Translate works as advertised and gets the job done, letting you instantly "speak" another language, voice-to-voice...

Weird bug adds ‘praises the iPad’ at the end of Google queries

Cody Lee ∙ Updated January 24, 2016

The rivalry between Apple and Google is arguably one of the biggest in the tech world, maybe even the world in general. The two companies are constantly fighting each other for smartphone and tablet marketshare, and they both have legions of loyal fans.

That's what makes this next story so amusing. A new bug has been discovered in the Google Now and Translate apps that show Apple a bit more love than you'd expect from a rival. Enter the right queries, and both apps will, oddly enough, "praise the iPad."

Lingual: Translate Text and Phrases to Over 30 Languages Using Siri

Jeff Benjamin ∙ January 26, 2012

And the Siri tweaks just keep rolling in. Lingual is one of the first 3rd party extensions for the awesome AssistantExtensions tweak that we covered earlier. It allows you to translate phrases or text into a variety of languages from the comforts of the Siri interface, and it's awesome for language learners and travelers.

It really is amazing what some developers have been able to do in the short period that the iPhone 4S has been jailbroken, and this one is nothing short of spectacular.