How it works
You send text with a target language and get the translation back; the source language can be detected at no extra cost. The Basic edition is a simple REST call to Google's neural machine translation model. The Advanced edition adds glossaries that fix how brand names and terms are translated, translation of Word, PowerPoint and PDF files that keeps their layout, batch jobs over files in Cloud Storage, custom models trained on your own examples, and a translation-tuned LLM.
Compared with asking a general chat model to translate, a dedicated API is predictable, keeps document formatting, honours glossaries and is priced simply per character. A chat model adapts tone and context better, at the cost of more variation between runs and per-token billing. DeepL, Microsoft's Azure Translator and Amazon Translate are the main alternatives.
Cloud Translation API pros and cons
Pros
- Simple per-character pricing with a free monthly allowance
- Over a hundred languages, with automatic language detection
- Glossaries keep product names and terms consistent
- Translates whole documents while keeping their layout
Cons
- Literal output can miss tone, idiom and context
- Needs a Google Cloud project with billing set up
- Custom models and document translation cost noticeably more
When to use Cloud Translation API
Pick it when
- Translating user content, listings or support messages at scale
- Consistent terminology across many languages matters
Skip it when
- Marketing copy where tone matters more than speed (use a translator, or review LLM output)
Cloud Translation API pricing
Free tier
First 500,000 characters a month free, then about $20 per million characters. Documents about $0.08 a page; custom models cost more.
Cloud Translation API pricing page (opens in a new tab)Approximate, checked September 2026.What the other tools cost
Related terms
More in AI and LLMs
Model providers