Microsoft has released the Skype Translator Preview, offering real-time translations between English and Spanish (or vice versa) through voice and video call.
The service has been shown off before, previously offering real-time translation between English and German, but the preview service looks to only offer Spanish and English as dedicated languages, with more coming soon.
In the promotional video, Microsoft shows a two students: one from Seattle and the other from New Mexico, communicating in seconds with one another through the translation service.
Skype Translator will show the translation in text on the right and through translated audio. The voice of the speaker will not be heard, instead one of Microsoft’s machine voices will be translated.
It is rather incredible how far the voice recognition platform has come. Microsoft has been working on perfecting the service for a few years, developing technology to translate spoken word in seconds.
For freelancers, this could be a major boon for global work. Where language barriers can stop contracts in certain countries, users will now be able to use Skype Translator and message potential clients worldwide.
Skype Translator will be available on Windows 8.1 and Windows 10 Preview Build for download. Users will also be able to translate over 40 written languages in real-time.
The full release of Skype Translation should come at the launch of Windows 10, later in 2015.
