Internet search giant Google has revealed an update to its Google Translate app that includes Word Lens, software that allows signs to be translated live through a phone’s camera.
Much of the details of the new update have been documented earlier this week, with the app promising to offer live audio translation to challenge Skype’s own attempts that entered a public beta late last year.
What hadn’t been known was the addition of Word Lens, which has existed as an app for some time now, offering offline translation with its target market being tourists visiting a strange land who want to translate road signs on the go.
Now however, Word Lens software will be included as standard to users downloading the Google Translate app.
Google has said that initially Word Lens will offer translations in English, French, German, Spanish, Portuguese and Russian, with an aim to expand this to other languages in the future.
Google has now also confirmed that the update will be rolled out to different regions in the coming days. For many with the iOS version of Google Translate, it will be their first glimpse at many of the new features, as Android users have had some real-time translation, but at a much reduced capacity to the latest update.
Thank you stickers image via Shutterstock
