How to translate an audio file with Google Translate
Google Translate is one of the most used translation tools on the Internet. It works with more than a dozen languages and with impressive accuracy than most of its competitors.
Unfortunately, when people think of Google Translate, they mostly think of it as a text-only translation tool. But it can do more. You can use it to translate audio files or live speech from one language to another at impressive speed. If you’ve never tried it, here’s how.
Use Google Translate to translate audio files for mobile
One of the best things about Google Translate is that you can access it on all major computer platforms. Unlike some Google Translate alternatives, you should be able to access the service as long as you can use a browser, regardless of brand or operating system, whether you’re using a desktop, tablet or mobile device.
If you plan to use it to translate an audio file, using your mobile device is a great option. Although you can access the service from a mobile web browser, the app is better suited for this task. To get started, head over to the Google Play Store or Apple App Store and download the Android or iOS version of the app.
Download: Google Translate for Android | iOS (Free)
So, let’s say you want to translate an audio file from English to Spanish in the application, you will need:
- Launch the Google Translate app.
- At the bottom of the screen you will find two languages. One on the left (English) and one on the right (Spanish). If your target language is not the default option, tap the language on the left and select the language you want to translate. Then, tap on the correct language and select the language you want to translate.
- Tap the microphone button at the bottom of the screen.
- Use another phone or media player to play the source audio file or start speaking after the sound.
- After you finish speaking or playing the audio file, a screen will appear showing the interpretation and transcription or voice recording of your audio file in both languages.
- Tap the small speaker icon above the annotated text to listen to your voice recording in a new language.
For best results, hold your phone as close as possible to the source of the audio file being played. Also try slowing down the audio file for more accurate results. A good application to slow down the tempo of an audio file on your smartphone is Music Speed Changer for iOS and Android.
Translate an audio file without interruption
While the steps above will help you work with short voice conversations, the software will pause you to provide an interpretation of your speech or audio file as soon as it detects a short break in the audio inputs.
Therefore, any short pause can cause unnecessary pauses even when trying to play a long speech or pre-recorded audio file. This can be especially annoying.
To resolve this issue:
- When working on long speech or pre-recorded audio conversations, after tapping the microphone button at the bottom of the Google Translate application screen, Please transcribe which is above.
- This should enable Google Translate’s transcription mode. In transcription mode, you’ll be able to take long breaks without interruption. You can also save the transcribed text for future reference. To do this, simply tap on the star icon in the upper right corner of the transcription results screen.
Use Google Translate to interpret conversations in real time
If you find yourself in situations where you need to use an unknown language in a real-time conversation, Google Translate can be very useful. For example, to translate a conversation from Spanish to English and from English to Spanish in real time with Google Translate, follow these steps:
- On the main screen of your Google Translate application, select the source language and the translation language. In this case, Spanish or English can be the source language or the translation language, since you will have to translate from one to the other in a two-way conversation.
- Click now Conversation in the lower left corner of the application screen.
- Click to translate the audio from Spanish to English Spanish speak at the bottom of the screen. After completing the conversation, you will receive your results in English.
- Likewise, tap to work on the English-Spanish exercises English language at the bottom of the screen and start talking. Since you will be chatting with someone, you can take turns speaking according to each user’s language.
Use Google Translate to Translate Audio Files on Desktop
Whether you’re using a Mac, Linux, Chromebook, or Windows computer, you should be able to interpret any type of MP3 or audio file using Google Translate from your desktop browser. To annotate audio files or live speech with Google Translate on desktop:
- Go to translate.google.com from your desktop browser.
- After the page loads, you will find two boxes, one for source language (left) and one for translation (right). Click one of the languages in the box on the left that corresponds to the language of your audio file. If you can’t find your preferred language in the default options, click the drop-down button to view other languages.
- In the box on the right, click the language you want the audio file to be translated into. Likewise, if you can’t find your default preferred languages, click the drop-down icon to open a larger list of languages.
- Next, click the microphone button in the lower left corner of the first box.
- Play the audio file you want to translate from your smartphone or any other media player.
Google Translate is more than just text translation
Translating texts, web pages, and documents is the most popular use case for Google Translate. However, this is not just a text translation service. You can translate almost any audio file into any language as long as Google Translate actively supports voice translation for that language.
