Pre-Translation

Pre-translation helps speed up the translation process and ease the work of translators. It also allows you to save funds as part of translations can be automated. You can use and combine the following types of pre-translation:

• AI Pre-Translate - uses AI Models to pre-translate the content.
• Machine Translation (MT) Pre-translate – takes translations from supported machine translation engines (MTE) and applies them to the project content. You need to configure at least one of the translation engines to enable this feature.
• Translation Memory (TM) Pre-translate – takes translations from the TM vault uploaded to the system and applies them to project content.

Tip

Use the Pre-translation Efficiency report to test which pre-translation methods work the best for your content.

Crowdin AI Read more about Crowdin AI and how to use it.

Machine Translation Read more about Machine Translation and how to use it.

Translation Memory Read more about Translation Memory and how to use it.

Manual Pre-translation

To apply Pre-translation manually, follow these steps:

1. Open your project and go to the Dashboard tab.
2. Click Pre-translation and select the preferred method (i.e., via Translation Memory, via Machine Translation, or AI).
3. Configure settings for pre-translation.
   • For pre-translation via TM:
     • Target languages
     • Files for pre-translation
     • Pre-translation parameters (minimum match ratio, strings for translation, approval options, label filters)
   • For pre-translation via MT:
     • MT engine
     • Target languages
     • Files for pre-translation
     • Pre-translation parameters (strings for translation, filtering with labels)
   • For pre-translation via AI:
     • AI prompt
     • Target languages
     • Files for pre-translation
     • Pre-translation parameters (strings for translation, filtering with labels)
4. Click Pre-Translation.

Note

If the TM Auto-substitution feature is enabled when pre-translating via TM, it means that TM suggestions improved to 100% will be treated as regular 100% matches.

Pre-translation Queue

The Pre-translation queue allows you to trigger multiple manual pre-translations via TM, MT, or AI, each with different settings. After initiating a pre-translation, each instance enters a queue with a status of Pending.

Upon triggering a manual pre-translation, you will receive a notification indicating that the pre-translation has been added to the queue. To review all pre-translations currently in the queue, navigate to Tools > Pre-translation queue in your project. Alternatively, click Pre-translation in the project’s Dashboard and select Queue to be redirected directly to the Tools > Pre-translation queue.

Each entry in the Pre-translation queue table includes the following details:

• Created at: Displays the date and time when the pre-translation was initiated
• Type: TM, MT (MT engine name), AI (AI prompt name)
• Status: Pending, In progress, Completed, Canceled

You can cancel any pre-translation that is still in the queue if needed. Additionally, for completed pre-translations, you can view a report detailing the target languages, number of translations added and skipped, file list, and more.

Automatic Pre-translation

You can automate the Pre-translation in the project Settings > Pre-translate. In this case, each time you upload new content to your project, the system will automatically trigger the Pre-translation and apply translations to untranslated content.

Read more about Automatic Pre-translation.

Handling QA Issues During Pre-translation via AI

If the AI provider returns translations with QA issues during pre-translation, Crowdin will collect the strings to which these faulty translations were applied and automatically reinitiate the pre-translation. The affected strings will be sent back to the AI provider along with details of the detected QA issues to ensure that the translations are corrected and meet quality standards.

Translation Memory Priority During Pre-translation via TM

When using pre-translation via TM and the Share TMs option is enabled, Crowdin applies translations from translation memories based on a specific priority order. This priority ensures that translations come from the most relevant source, optimizing translation consistency and quality.

The order of priority is as follows:

1. Default TM: Matches are first searched for in the project’s default TM.
2. Assigned TMs: If no match is found in the default TM, the system continues searching through any TMs assigned specifically to the project.
3. Shared TMs: If no match is found in the default or assigned TMs, translations are retrieved from shared TMs available to the project.

This sequence allows Crowdin to apply translations from the most relevant TM source first, ensuring that high-quality matches are prioritized when multiple TMs are available.