I once worked for an international company headquartered in Switzerland and have always been fascinated by languages and dialects. I enjoyed frequent interactions with Swiss colleagues who knew four or five different languages. Their emails gave me an exciting taste of another culture. I also exchange emails frequently with half-Italians and Italian relatives.
While the person I am emailing is more comfortable reading and writing in their mother tongue than in English, my own inability to write in that language does not allow me to slow down. I use Microsoft Translator to translate my emails for them and their emails for me Not only does it expand my perspective on the world, it gives me the opportunity to sharpen my Italian because I see how the translator converts Italian into English and English into Italian.
This is easy to do if you want to translate text into Outlook email, Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, or PowerPoint presentations. Maybe you work for an international company, like I did, or maybe you’re communicating with colleagues or clients who feel more comfortable writing in their local language. None of this is a problem for Office, which offers translation courtesy of an AI-powered translator service that can translate a selection of text or an entire document, file or message between different languages.
The Translator service is accessible across multiple Microsoft products and technologies to consumers and enterprises. Translator integrates into Bing, Microsoft Office, SharePoint, Microsoft Edge, Skype Translator and Visual Studio. Microsoft Translator is also available as an app for iOS / iPadOS, Apple Watch, Android OS, and Android Wear.
Translator supports more than 100 languages, including English, French, Italian, Spanish, German, Chinese, Japanese and Arabic and Fijian, Haitian Creole, Icelandic, Kurdish, Maltese, Serbian with some less common languages, and Ukrainian. .
The accuracy of Microsoft Translator is assessed using a BLEU (Bilingual Assessment Understudy) score. This score measures the difference between a machine-based translation and a human translation of the same source text. A 2018 report measuring the translation from Chinese to English gave Microsoft Translate a grade of 69 out of 100, a higher score than human translation. This is likely to improve over time, at least according to a November 2021 Microsoft Translator blog post that explains how the company is working to advance its machine translation technology.
Now, here’s how to use Translator in different office applications.
Translate to Microsoft Outlook on the desktop
If you purchased Outlook for Windows 2019 as a standalone app or later as part of Microsoft Office or Microsoft 365, translation functionality is built-in. To set it up, click File Select Menu Options. In the Outlook Options window, select Language.
The window now displays your default display language for Office. Scroll down to the translation section. Here, you can decide how to handle messages received in other languages, always choose to translate them, ask before translating or never translate. Next, select the target language if it is not your default language. Then click Add a language Button and select any language for you No. Want to see a translation.
IDGYou can change the translator settings in Outlook to better manage the feature. (Click to enlarge image.)
Close the Options window and return to the main Outlook screen. Open an email you want to translate into your local language. Depending on the options you choose, the email will automatically translate or give you the ability to translate it. Either way, you need to see a link in your message to translate the message into your language If not, click Translate Button on the ribbon and select Translate message Order
IDGOutlook should offer to translate a message automatically. If not, you can manually trigger the translation. (Click to enlarge image.)
Run the translation command, and the whole message will be displayed in your local language. You can then switch back and forth between the translation and the original text and turn on automatic translation if it is not already enabled.
IDGYou can easily jump between translated messages and original text. (Click to enlarge image.)
What if you want to take a reverse trip and translate an email written in another language from your own mother tongue? Unfortunately, Microsoft does not currently offer any reliable or effective way to do this in Outlook. The easiest solution is to translate the text into Word, then copy and paste it into your message in Outlook.
Translate to Microsoft Outlook on the web
The translation service is also accessible for Outlook on the web. To set it up here, sign in to Outlook with your Microsoft or business account. Click Settings Icon at the top right. In the settings pane, click on the link View all Outlook settings. In the Settings window that pops up, select Mail And then Message management. Scroll down to the translation section and you’ll find the same settings as the desktop version of Outlook.
IDGWeb Outlook offers the same translation settings as the desktop version. (Click to enlarge image.)
When you receive a message in a different language, the translation feature will suggest you to translate it Click on the link to translate it. You can then switch back and forth between the original text and the translation.
Like the desktop flavor of Outlook, the web version does not currently offer any effective way to translate a new email from your own mother tongue into a different language. Again, translating text into Word is your best bet.
Translate into Microsoft Word
The translation feature in Microsoft Word works similarly on desktop and online versions.
Open a document that you want to translate, either in whole or in part. Select Revaluation Ribbon tab. To customize features before using it, click Translate Button and select Translator’s choices On the Translator pane to the right, make sure the switch is set to Yes “Offer to translate content not in the language I read.” You can add any language No. Want a translation?
If you only want to translate specific text, select the text. Click Translate Button on the ribbon and select Translation selection. On the Translator panel on the right, make sure the correct source language is identified. If it is not correct, click on the down arrow for target language and change it. Hover your mouse over each word in the translation, and the feature will only show you the translation of that word. To add a translation to your current document, click Blue Insert Button on the far right.
IDGSelect the text you want to translate and then run the translation command. (Click to enlarge image.)
Similarly, to translate the complete document, click Translate Icon on the ribbon and select Translate documents. In the translator pane, make sure Documents The tab is selected. Make sure the target language is correct. Click the blue Translate Button on the far right. A new document is created and pops up with the complete translation.
IDGIn Word, you can choose to translate the entire text as well as the selected text. (Click to enlarge image.)
Translating from your own language into another works much the same way. Select the text you want to translate (or do not select one if you want to translate the whole document), then click Translate Select the icon and any one in the Ribbon Review tab Translation selection Or Translate documents. In the translation pane, set the target language in the To: field. Any selected text is automatically translated and displayed on the panel. To translate a document, click blue Translate Button
Translate into Microsoft Excel
Excel translation only works on the desktop version of the program. Select a cell or multiple cells that contain the text you want to translate Click Revaluation Select Menu Translate. In the translation pane, make sure the source and destination language are correct. You can then hover over each word to see the unique translation.
IDGIn the desktop version of Excel, you can select one or more cells to translate text. (Click to enlarge image.)
To insert translated text into a cell of your spreadsheet, select Translate in the pane and copy. Click on the target cell and then paste the text.
Translate into Microsoft PowerPoint
Like Excel, PowerPoint translations are only available on desktop clients. PowerPoint can translate selected text (not a complete presentation); It works just like translating selected cells into Excel.
PowerPoint also offers a simple feature that can translate your presentation as you speak, which is great if you have an audience that is more comfortable with another language. Translations appear as subtitles as you present the presentation.
To get started, click Slideshow Check the menu and the box for it Always use subtitles. Then select Subtitle settings. In the web version of PowerPoint, click Slideshow Select the bottom arrow from the menu and side Always use subtitles. Select or confirm spoken language. Then select the subtitle language. Return to the Subtitles Settings menu to choose where you want the subtitles to appear – Overlaid at the bottom, Top, top of the slide, or bottom of the slide.
IDGIn PowerPoint, you can choose a language for translated subtitles and specify where the subtitles appear. (Click to enlarge image.)
When you present a presentation as a slideshow, say the words from each slide or from your own comment. The subtitles for your spoken words will be displayed in the language of your choice
IDGSubtitles appear in the translated language as you speak (Click to enlarge image.)
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