14 DAY TRIAL // Today, Google has graced us with an important update to its Google Translate application on both iOS and Android platforms. The update brings a whole range of much-needed features for translating words and phrases a lot easier.
Google Translate on Android got a new feature that simplifies the way users translate text by removing the need to manually copy and paste words from applications and then into the Translate app, which can be quite difficult to do when you’re using a mobile phone.
Google also focused its attention on the iOS version and launched a feature that allows users to translate words in offline mode. In addition, Word Lens feature now works on both Simplified and Traditional Chinese.
Word Lens uses the built-in camera on the phone in order to scan and identify foreign text. The translation appears on the device’s display, depending on the language that was previously selected. This feature now supports instant visual translation of Chinese and it can be used for translating menus, signs and more content.
Word Lens app was developed by Quest Visual but acquired by Google, which integrated it in the Google Translate app in January last year.
Tap to Translate feature integrated in the app
The highlight of this update is the Tap to Translate feature which allows users to highlight and copy text to clipboard in order to prompt a chathead. The tapping will bring up a small box that translates the text, with the option to hear a phrase or change the language to another one. It makes it easier to highlight the text of a message, comment, song lyric and more, in various apps and get an instant translation.
While still in the pop-up chathead, users can type out a new phrase and quickly copy the translated text. In addition, Tap to Translate feature works in any app and offline, as long as users download the proper language package in advance. 52 language packages for offline translation were made available for the iOS Google Translate app and their size was shrunk to 25MB each.
Google decided to roll out the update for iOS platforms first while the Android version will come out in the next few days.
