Paste or type text, pick a target language, and get a translation. The source language can be detected automatically or set manually.
It is the tool most expats reach for first — the moment you arrive somewhere new, every sign, menu and form arrives in a language you may not read yet. A fast, reliable translator closes that gap without making you switch apps or copy text between tabs.
When to use this
Reach for the translator when you need the meaning of foreign text fast: reading a street sign, decoding a restaurant menu, replying to a message from your landlord, or filling in a form at a clinic or government office. It is built for the everyday comprehension gaps that appear the moment your surroundings switch language.
It is less suited to situations where precision is legally or medically binding — a contract clause, a prescription, a court document. Machine translation gives you the gist reliably, but for those, pair it with the Meaning tool to check individual terms and have a human confirm the final wording.
How this works
When you paste or type text and choose a target language, the tool sends your text to the MyMemory translation API, a large public translation memory that returns machine translations built from parallel corpora of professionally translated sentences. If you leave the source language on "Detect", the text is first analysed by an offline n-gram language identifier that compares the character and letter-frequency patterns of your input against known language profiles, then passes the detected language along with the target to the translation engine.
Translation memory works by matching your input against millions of previously translated sentence pairs. When an exact or close match exists, you get a fluent, human-quality result; when the input is unusual or very short, the engine falls back to statistical machine translation, which is accurate for common phrases but can stumble on idioms, slang and highly context-dependent text. For those, the Meaning and Synonyms tools on this site go deeper than a straight translation.
The tool caps input at 5,000 characters per request, which covers most emails, messages and short documents. It does not store your text, does not learn from it, and each request is independent. Auto-detection is reliable on longer passages but can hesitate on very short or mixed-language input — if it picks the wrong source language, simply select the correct one manually and translate again.
Worked example
You arrive at a Thai clinic and the intake form asks "ท่านมีอาการแพ้ยาหรือไม่" — you want to know what it says in English.
- 1Paste "ท่านมีอาการแพ้ยาหรือไม่" into the source box and leave the source language on "Detect language".
- 2Set the target language to English and press Translate.
- 3The detector identifies Thai and the engine returns "Do you have any drug allergies?" — enough to answer the form correctly.
- 4Press Swap to translate your reply ("No, I do not") back into Thai for the receptionist.
Frequently asked questions
- How accurate is machine translation?
- For common sentences and standard vocabulary it is fluent and reliable. For idioms, slang, legal or medical text, and very short or ambiguous input, it can be literal or wrong. Use it to understand the gist and to draft messages, but have a human check anything where precision matters.
- Why does auto-detect sometimes pick the wrong language?
- Detection compares letter and character patterns against language profiles. Very short strings, mixed-language text, and languages that share an alphabet can confuse it. When it does, just choose the source language manually from the dropdown and translate again.
- Is there a character limit?
- Yes — 5,000 characters per request, which covers most messages, emails and short documents. For longer text, translate it in sections.
- Is my text stored or used to train the model?
- No. Each request is independent and the tool does not persist your input. The upstream translation memory is a public service, so avoid pasting sensitive personal or confidential information.
- Can I translate between two non-English languages?
- Yes. Choose any source and any target language from the 60+ supported — the engine handles direct pairs without routing through English.
Related tools
Translations provided by the MyMemory translation API. Language detection uses an offline n-gram identifier. No external data source for the method itself. Last updated: September 2026.
These tools are provided for general everyday use. Translation, definitions and synonyms are machine- or community-generated and may contain errors; exchange rates are reference values and not transaction rates; unit conversions use exact constants but do not account for regional unit variants beyond those listed. Always confirm critical information with an authoritative source before acting on it.