Blog post: Leave translation (technology) to translators

19 January 2026

English source text:
Final takeaway

Dutch machine translation:
Laatste afhaalmaaltijd (Final takeaway meal)

This came up in a machine translation I was offered a while ago. I don't usually work with machine translations, but a client needed a translation quickly and thought they'd help me by having it machine-translated, so I "only" needed to check it.

Did it help me? Not really. It may have saved me some typing (I'm a fast typist, so probably not that much anyway), but I ended up rewriting almost every sentence. Not because they were wrong, but because the style didn't fit the purpose (a light-hearted blog post).

Did it help with consistency in terminology? No, the few terms used in the text were inconsistently translated. In addition, wordplay wasn't recognised and translated literally, and in a few cases the translation said the exact opposite of the source text.

My final Happy Meal on machine translation:

• Never use a machine translation without checking it. And don't just read through the translation, but also compare it to the source text to make sure the translation is correct.
   
• If you are not proficient in the source language, ask a translator to do the checking. They understand language; machine translation doesn't, it's just an algorithm. And even if you think you are pretty fluent in the source language, it might still not be enough to distinguish all the nuances and cultural differences between languages.
   
• Before asking a translator to check your machine translated text, ask whether they are happy to work with a machine translation. In some cases a machine translation can save time and money (depending on the type of text and the machine translation tool used), but often it doesn't.
   

The easiest option? Hire a translator to help you with translation. Professional translators know when and how to use technology, so you can focus on your own area of specialisation.