Google Translate adds Vietnamese to direct camera translation

The tech giant has also updated the app to automatically detect the language and translate directly back and forth between different languages instead of just from English to others and vice versa as before.

Aside from Vietnamese, new languages supported in the update include Malay, Thai, Arabic, Greek, Hindi, Latin, Latvian, Mongolian, Nepali, Igbo, and Javanese.

In all, the app now supports 88 languages. To use it, one only needs to point the camera at the text and take a photo, and the app will take care of the rest.

The tool offers three options: instant translation, scanning, in which it scans the text and translates, and importing, in which it translates from a file already existing in the user’s device.

For now Google Translate offers the updated version only to limited users, but by this month most users will be able to access it.

The new feature will be a boon to foreigners visiting Vietnam since a majority of the population does not speak English fluently.

Microsoft Translator added Vietnamese to its text-to-speech synthesizers last year.

Vietnam received 7.3 million foreign arrivals in January-May this year, up 8.8 percent from a year ago, putting the country on track to meet its annual target of 18 million visitors.