Google Translate Adds Pronunciation Practice Tool in the US and India

Google Translate is turning 20 this week, and Google is celebrating by introducing a top-requested feature from its over 1 billion monthly users: A new pronunciation practice tool is now available on the Google Translate Android app for users in the US and India, and it supports English, Hindi, and Spanish.

Back in February, the Google Translate app already added two AI-powered features in the US and India: The ‘Understand’ button that provides additional context about the meaning of a translation, and the ‘Ask’ button allowing users to follow up with questions about specific scenarios.

The new “Practice” button will now appear right between the ‘Understand’ and ‘Ask’ options. Tapping it will open a pop-up with a ‘Pronounce’ button, which will let Google Translate analyse how users speak and provide feedback on the quality of the pronunciation.

While Google is starting with just 3 languages to practice, Translate currently supports almost 250 languages, which represnets 95% of the world’s population. “About a third of people using Translate on mobile turn to the app to learn and practice a new language,” Google said today.

Google shared more interesting facts about how people use Google Translate today, as well as how it’s using AI to understand the trickiest phrases, including local slang. The full blog post is well worth a read.