‘Google Translate gets real-time speech translation’

Google’s translation app will have the ability to translate conversations from a number of popular languages ​​in real time, writes an American newspaper. The company would also come up with a service to translate street signs in real time, for example.

An update to the Google Translate app will include the ability to translate conversations in real time, The New York Times reported. A number of popular languages ​​are supported; it’s unclear which ones they are. Google has not yet confirmed The New York Times’ coverage.

It is unclear whether the real-time option can only be used in ‘real’ conversations, or whether the functionality will also end up in Google’s video chat app Hangouts, for example. Google Translate will display the translation in text, unlike Skype Translator, where the translation is actually spoken.

In addition, according to the newspaper, Google will soon be introducing a service with which a user can translate written text via his smartphone camera in real time, for example the text on a foreign street sign. It is unclear whether that functionality is incorporated in the Translate app, or whether it is a separate service. The translate app already has the ability to translate written text, but that doesn’t happen in real time: the app has to analyze a photo first. In May, Google acquired another company that developed an app that allowed users to translate written text in real time.