Google announced a host of new translation-related features at its Live from Paris event today, including improved contextual search, a redesigned iOS app, and seamless AR translation through Google Lens.
The search giant is improving contextual translation in English, French, German, Japanese and Spanish. This means that words and phrases with multiple meanings are translated based on the context of the text. It’s a great way to make sure your sentence sounds natural and that you use idiomatic words. It works a bit like Linguee and Reverso Context.
This can also be useful to avoid using an offensive or hateful meaning of a sentence when you are not fluent in a language. Google said this update will roll out in the coming weeks and will bring support for more languages in the coming months.
Image Credits: Google
Last year, the company updated the Google Translate Android app with a new design that followed the “Material You” design system. Now it brings new features and a revamped user interface to the iOS app. The updated app has a large microphone button in the bottom center so that users can easily enter text by voice. The iOS app also introduces a dynamic font that makes translations easier to read as you type. Plus, the new design makes it easier to choose languages with fewer taps.
In addition, the redesigned app adds gestures such as swiping down to access recent translations and holding the language button to quickly choose a recently used language.
Image Credits: Google
The iOS app also recently added support for offline translation of 33 new languages, including Basque, Corsican, Hawaiian, Hmong, Kurdish, Latin, Luxembourgish, Sundanese, Yiddish, and Zulu.
Last September, Google showed off a new translation capability that seamlessly blends translated text from the real world into the background image. This means that if you translate a poster written in another language, it won’t look out of place. The company is now rolling out this capability to Android phones with 6 GB of RAM or more.
Aside from this, Google also announced the global launch of multi-search, along with enhancements to Maps, including immersive views in five new cities and expanding the uncluttered directions feature to all users.