Translating text in Word

Three entries, three routes

At the very top of the Task menu there are three entries for translation:

• English – translates straight into your first language, no question asked.
• German – the same for your second language.
• Translate – asks for the target language. In the menu this entry is spelled out as "Translate Text/Files"; the one below it is "Correct Text/Files". In the menu this entry is spelled out as "Translate Text/Files"; the one below it is "Correct Text/Files".

The first two entries carry the name of whichever language is configured. If yours say something other than "English" and "German", different languages are set up for you – you change them in the settings under Default translation language 1 and 2.

[IMAGE: word-task-menu-top-en.png – the three translation entries in the menu]

Translating a passage

Select the text and pick one of the three entries. The translation replaces the selection in the document.

With Translate a language picker appears first. Your second language is preselected; you can pick any other.

Translations are never marked up

Unlike Correct or Improve, a translation never appears as a tracked change. The selected text is replaced, and that is that. This is deliberate – in a translation practically every word would be a change, and the markup would be unreadable.

For you that means: save first, or work in a copy. Otherwise you have no easy route back to the original text.

With nothing selected: whole files

If you click Translate without having selected any text, the whole-document translation opens instead. That is not an accident but the second purpose of the same entry – the same feature as Translate Text/Files.

It lets you translate a complete document, or several files, in one go rather than selecting section by section.

What happens to formatting

Bold, italic and paragraph formats are carried over as far as possible. With very long selections formatting can be partly lost; at what length depends on a central setting. If that happens to you: work in smaller sections.

Footnotes, fields, cross-references and comments do not survive a translation reliably. Check those in documents that contain them.

When nothing happens

• You selected nothing and picked one of the two language entries – those need a selection.
• The language picker was cancelled – without a target language nothing happens.