Google announced today that it has expanded its support for languages on Google Translate by adding 110 new languages. This nearly doubles the total number of languages that can be translated by the platform. The company used the Large Language Model PaLM 2 to help with these additions. The newly added languages are spoken by more than 614 million people, which represents about 8 percent of the world’s population. Approximately a quarter of these languages come from Africa, marking the largest expansion of African languages to date.
Google’s philosophy for choosing languages to support focuses on prioritizing the most widely used varieties of each language. The company recognizes the immense variation in languages, including regional varieties, dialects, and different spelling standards. Google aims to provide translations that are closest to the most commonly used versions of each language. For example, when translating Romani, Google’s models produce text closest to Southern Vlax Romani, while also incorporating elements of other dialects like Northern Vlax and Balkan Romani.
With this update, Google Translate now supports 243 languages, as part of the company’s initiative to eventually support 1,000 languages using AI technology. Apple Translate, in comparison, currently supports 21 languages, including separate options for US and UK English. Apple recently announced plans to add Hindi to its Translate app, highlighting the differences in approach and investment between Apple and Google in language translation tools.
To see the complete list of languages added to Google Translate, users can visit a help page published by the company. This expansion reflects Google’s commitment to making language translation more accessible to a global audience and catering to the diverse linguistic needs of users around the world.
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https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/06/google-translate-just-nearly-doubled-its-number-of-supported-languages/