Google Translate is a part of Google Workspace. It is a web-based, free-to-use translation service developed by Google in April 2006. It translates several forms of text and media, for instance, words, phrases, or web pages. Now, to enhance the service, Google has announced that it is adding 110 more new languages.
A couple of weeks ago, the brand added support for 24 new languages to it; now, to add an extra layer of convenience, it is bringing the total number of supported languages to 243. However, Google has never added as many languages to Google Translate as it is doing now. On the comparison side, Apple Translate supports only 20 languages, and Microsoft Translator supports 135 languages. That gives Google an upper hand among the top three players.
Google has achieved this feat with the help of the company’s PaLM2 large language model. A few notable, newly supported languages include Afar, Cantonese, Manx, NKo, Punjabi (Shahmukhi), Tamazinght (Amazigh), and Tok Pisin. Regarding this, the giant stated that the 110 newly added languages “represent more than 614 million speakers, opening up translations for around 8% of the world’s population.”
In addition, Google also stated that “some are major world languages with over 100 million speakers. Others are spoken by small communities of Indigenous people, and a few have almost no native speakers but active revitalization efforts.”
A quarter of the 110 languages come from Africa, including Fon, Kikongo, Luo, Ga, Swati, Venda, and Wolfo. These additions make this the largest expansion of African languages on Google Translate yet.
