There is nothing to do. Even after showing off all your best persuasive skills, no one has agreed to translate those English Word documents downloaded from the Internet for you. Then what do you want to do? Do you intend to resign yourself or do you want to start using solutions adapted to your needs? The second? Perfect!
If you dedicate a few minutes of your free time to me, I can explain how to translate a Word document without removing its original formatting (or, at least, preserving it as much as possible) and without necessarily having to shell out money. There are numerous solutions you can turn to: from Word itself (which, perhaps you don’t know, but includes very effective translation tools), to some online translation services, which support the direct loading of Word documents, allowing them to be translated into many different languages.
It’s up to you to choose the resource that best suits your needs and exploit it: find all the information and instructions you need right below. All that remains for me is to let you read the tutorial and wish you a good job with your multi-language Word documents.
Index
- How to translate a document with Word
- How to translate a Word document online
- Word Online
- Google translator
- Doc Translator
- How to translate a Word document from smartphones and tablets
How to translate a document with Word
As I said at the beginning, you may not have noticed it yet, but it is possible to translate a Word document directly using the famous word processing software from Microsoft. Unfortunately the translated text is not saved directly in a new DOC or DOCX file, it is displayed in the browser, but you can copy and paste it into a new Word document without losing too many details of its original formatting.
If you don’t have Word installed on your computer yet, though, you need to do this first. So, download and configure Word by following the instructions I gave you in my specific tutorial on what to do . Keep in mind that the program is part of the Office suite , which is paid (with costs starting from 7 euros / month or from 69 euros / year), but you can try it for free for 30 days, as I explained to you in my guide on how to download Office for free .
Then start the program, selecting the relative link that you find in the Windows Start menu or in the MacOS Launchpad , and once the Word screen is displayed, open the document you are interested in going to act by selecting the appropriate option or by accessing the menu File at the top left, choosing the Open item in it and the location and the reference file.
When viewing the document, to be able to translate a document with Word you must select the Revision tab from the toolbar at the top and click first on the Translate button and then on the item Choose translation language or Set translation language in the menu that appears.
In the window that opens, use the Translation from and Translation into drop-down menus to indicate the source languages (eg English ) and destination (eg Italian ) of the document to be translated, make sure that the language of your choice is selected ( eg Italian ) also in the drop-down menu Choice of language for the mini-translator and click on the OK button to save the settings.
If the drop-down menus related to the choice of language are empty and inside them you find the wording no service available , try the following solutions.
- Select the Word Revisiontab and click first on the Translate button and then on the Choose translation language item in the menu that opens. Answer affirmatively to the warning that is displayed on the screen, click on the item Detect new search services from the bar that appears on the right and answer Yes to Word’s request for the periodic check of new search services.
- Click on the Windows Start button (the flaglocated in the lower left corner of the screen), search for “control panel” in the menu that opens and select the Control Panel icon from the search results. In the window that opens, go to Uninstall a program , select the item relating to Microsoft Office and click on the Change button located at the top. At this point, click on the Yes button , put the check mark next to the Add / remove features item , click on the Next button , expand the itemShared features , click on the down arrow located next to the item Correction tools , choose the option Complete execution from the local computer from the menu that opens and finish the setup by first clicking on the Continue button and then on the Close button .
Word’s translation services should now work properly. Therefore, after selecting the source and destination languages of the document, go back to the Revision tab of the program, click on the Translate button and select the item Translate document [from (source language) to (target language)] from the menu that appears.
Therefore, answer in the affirmative to the warning that is displayed on the screen, choose the browser in which to view the translation (if necessary) and wait a few seconds: a Web page will open with the translated version of your document inside.
If you want to create a DOC or DOCX document with the translated version of the document, select all the text displayed in the browser (you can use the mouse or the key combination Ctrl + A ), copy and paste it into a new Word document: its formatting does not it will be identical to the original file, but it should come close. Finally, save the translated document by going to the File menu of Word, and that’s it!
If you want, you can also translate single words or phrases within the document by clicking on the Translate button in Word and selecting the options Translate selected text (to translate the selected text portions) and Mini-translator (to translate the words below mouse pointer) from the menu that opens.
How to translate a Word document online
If you prefer to use specific Web services that work directly and comfortably from the browser , you can translate a Word document online using the ad hoc resources that I have indicated below.
However, please note that online translation services involve uploading documents to the Internet and this could pose a potential privacy risk (as you cannot have direct control over what is done with the files after they are uploaded). My advice, if you intend to work with documents that contain highly confidential information, is not to turn to such solutions.
Word Online
Using Word Online , Microsoft’s free word processing platform with features very similar to its desktop counterpart, you can view and edit text documents and even take advantage of the translation function. Unlike the software version it is totally free, but to be able to use it you need a Microsoft account.
To use Word Online, connect to the home page of the service and if necessary log in to your Microsoft account (if you don’t have one yet, you can create it by following the instructions in my guide on what to do ).
Now, if the document you want to act on is on your OneDrive account , select it from those listed, otherwise upload it from your computer by clicking on the Upload item on the right and wait for the DOC or DOCX file to open.
Now that you are viewing the document, to be able to translate it, select the Revision tab located at the top, click on the arrow next to the Translate menu at the top, choose the Translate document option and use the From and To menus on the right to indicate the input and output languages and press the Translate button and wait for the procedure to complete.
Once the translation has been completed, you will be shown a copy of the document in the target language which you can save on your computer by clicking on the (…) button at the top right and on the Download item from the proposed menu.
If you are interested in this, I would like to point out that Word Online also allows you to translate single words in the document. To do this, select the reference word or phrase, go to the Review tab , click on the arrow next to the Translate menu , choose the Translate selection option and use the tools on the right to adjust the input and output language , then press the Insert button to make any replacements to the text.
Google translator
Google offers one of the most advanced and complete translation services in the world: Google Translate , which allows you to translate words, entire sentences and documents in DOCX, PDF, PPTX or XLS format. You can therefore use it to perform the operation described in this guide in a simple and fast way. Furthermore, it is totally free, it is not mandatory to have a Google account to use it and it supports an endless number of languages.
To take advantage of Google Translate, connected to the home page of the service and select the Documents tab located at the top, then indicate the input and output languages using the menus located respectively at the top left and right (e.g. you can set everything to translate Word document from English to Italian or to translate Word document into English ). For the input language you can also set the automatic detection by choosing the Automatic detection option and you can also invert the idioms between them by clicking on the button with the double arrow .
Then, press the Search button on the computer located in the center, select the DOCX file on your computer that you want to translate, press the Translate button to be able to translate Word document with Google and wait for it to be loaded and processed by the service.
Once the process is complete, click on the Download translation button to download a copy of the translated document in the same original format to your computer. Easier than that?
Doc Translator
Another great tool you can consider turning to to translate Word document is Doc Translator . It is an online service that supports as many as 109 different languages and allows you to translate files in DOC, DOCX, XML and all other Office formats that are fed quickly and effortlessly. It doesn’t require you to create an account and it’s free.
To use Doc Translator, connected to the home page of the service , press the Upload file button and select the Word document on your computer that you want to translate. Alternatively, drag the file directly into your browser window and wait for upload.
Subsequently, use the drop-down menus at the bottom left and right to indicate respectively the input language and the output language (for the input language the automatic detection of the language used is also available), press the Translate button located a little further in low and waits for the procedure to be completed.
Once the translation has been completed, the download of the document will be started automatically, in the same format as the original file. If the download does not start by itself, force the procedure by clicking on the link Download your translated document! .
How to translate a Word document from smartphones and tablets
You don’t have a computer at hand and would you like to understand if there is a way to translate a Word document from smartphones and tablets ? If so, I’m sorry to disappoint you, but there are no ad hoc resources available. What you can do, however, is to take advantage of the online services that I have indicated in the previous lines directly from the browser on your device . Nothing changes, you just have to be careful to replace “clicks” with “taps”.
You can also consider using translation apps , such as the ones I indicated in my specific guide on the subject , but manually entering the text of the injury document. Alternatively, you can use them to frame the document with the camera of your mobile phone or tablet and view the translation in real time, as long as the function in question is supported by the app of your choice.