Reddit Expands Machine Learning Translation Features, Supporting Over 35 Languages

Reddit has announced the implementation of machine learning-powered translation features across its platform, expanding support to over 35 additional language regions in Europe, Asia, and Latin America. This initiative aims to make the predominantly English social network accessible to a broader non-English-speaking user base.

Approximately five months after launching a site-wide translation service for French users, Reddit is now extending this service further. Prior to this expansion, Reddit allowed users to translate individual posts in various languages. Additionally, users could specify their preferred content language for recommendations and set display languages, enabling the Reddit interface itself to be translated into the chosen language.

This update follows Reddit's public listing seven months ago. While the company reports continued growth in its user base and advertising revenue, a key strategy for expanding its audience appears to be increasing the availability of content in multiple languages.

The new translation feature on Reddit allows users to automatically convert posts and their associated comments from the community's original language into the user's own language based on their Reddit settings. This facilitates seamless multilingual conversations within specific subreddits without the need to manually translate each reply. Users can post in their preferred language, and as long as Reddit supports that language, the post will be automatically translated into the community's default language.

For users in supported regions, a new translation icon will appear in the menu, enabling them to view content in their preferred language.

Translated posts on Reddit will be marked accordingly, and users have the option to view the original text.

Similar to the approach taken earlier this year with French text, Reddit has indicated that such content will be indexed by search engines in its supported languages. This means that users searching in their native language will also encounter Reddit results.

Reddit has not provided a comprehensive list of all the newly supported languages, but the translation service is currently available in Brazil and Spain, suggesting support for at least Brazilian Portuguese and Spanish—though it may be limited to these two countries for now.