Speak and Translate Languages

Translation apps become genuinely useful at the point where you stop typing. This one is built around speaking: say a sentence in your own language and it produces the translation, then reads it aloud in the target language. That last step is what makes a conversation possible, because showing a stranger a screen works for a word and fails for a sentence, while a spoken phrase can simply be answered. Photo translation covers the other half of travelling. Point the camera at a menu, a road sign, a medicine packet or a form, and the text is recognised and translated, which handles all the situations where nobody is available to ask and the words are not ones you could type without knowing the alphabet. Speech-to-text converts what you say into written text, which doubles as dictation when typing in another language is slow. Language support is extensive, covering the major world languages and many smaller ones, and processing is quick enough that a conversation does not stall while it thinks. Translations can be shared straight to messaging apps, which is useful when the person you need to reach is not in front of you. It suits travellers, students and anyone working with colleagues or customers in another language.