Whether you are dealing with foreign research papers, international invoices, or travel documents, translating an entire PDF manually is incredibly tedious. Instead of copying and pasting text paragraph by paragraph, you can use Google Translate’s built-in document translation feature to translate the entire file at once while preserving its original formatting.
How to Translate a PDF
- Open your web browser and navigate to translate.google.com.
- At the top of the white translation box, click the Documents button (located next to Text and Websites).
- Click the Browse your computer button and select the PDF file you want to translate. Google Translate supports files up to 10MB in size.
- At the top of the screen, select the original language of the document on the left (or select Detect language), and select your desired output language on the right.
- Click the blue Translate button.
Downloading the Translated Document
Depending on the size of the PDF, the translation process may take a few seconds. Once complete, a Download translation button will appear. Clicking this will download a brand new PDF file to your computer containing the translated text. Impressively, Google will attempt to keep the original layout, images, and fonts intact, making it much easier to read the translated document in its proper context.