Jul 6, 2022 - Technology

Facebook's AI translator now works with 200 languages

Ina Fried

Animated illustration of a speech bubble rotating between different languages, all say "Hello!". — Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios

Facebook parent Meta says an updated version of its machine-learning-based language translation engine can now handle 200 languages.

Why it matters: In a world that is increasingly online, many people are excluded from important information resources because of limited translation availability.

Details: The technology, dubbed NLB-200, is part of Facebook's "No Language Left Behind" initiative. A prior version could translate among 100 languages.

Meta will use the system to help with more than 25 billion translations a day, while also open-sourcing both the model and other resources as well as providing grants to nonprofits with ideas for how to use the technology.
Meta has also partnered with the Wikimedia Foundation, which is using the technology to translate articles in 20 languages for which few or no machine-language resources exist.

What they're saying: "The AI modeling techniques we used are helping make high-quality translations for languages spoken by billions of people around the world," CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a Facebook post.

Go deeper: Meta plans AI-driven universal translator

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Facebook's AI translator now works with 200 languages

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