Improved translation service

Mark Barnes (Logos) · 2025-06-05T00:01:25+00:00

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A few days ago, we shipped an improvement to our translation service, moving away from Google and DeepL as providers and switching to AI. Before making this change, our language teams carefully evaluated translations provided by Google, DeepL, and various AI models to choose the best provider in their language. That means a few translations may continue to go to the old providers where AI can't provide us with an adequate translation.

This has allowed us to:

Offer translation from more languages than ever before, including New Testament Greek, Gothic, and Coptic.
Provide context to the translation service, which helps the translator with ambiguous or technical terms.
10x the number of times the translation tool can be used before subscribers run out of AI credits (there's no change for those who bought translation with L10).

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Comments

DMB

Thank you, Mark. Coptic!

NichtnurBibelleser

@Mark Barnes (Logos) Thanks for the update! As far as I see, a translation Latin to German isn't supported? Will that be coming in the near future?

(Win 11; Verbum 42.1.10; Pro Subscription)

Mark Barnes (Logos)

@NichtnurBibelleser — I'm not seeing a problem with Latin to German. Could you try again?

Beloved Amodeo

@Mark Barnes (Logos) I sign in with those who are initially pleased. I did a brief test with Hosea 5 Göttingen Septuagint and Psalm 131 Leiden Peshitta and translation tool returned impressive results. I will continue to experiment and report if I find any problems. Thanks for the good work!

NichtnurBibelleser

@Mark Barnes (Logos) You are right, it works for the Logos Vg, but not for my Personal Book of the Patrologia Latinae, which I tried first (and what would be really nice to have it work):

NichtnurBibelleser

Could the PB issue be related to this one here?

Andrew Batishko

By design, personal books do not support translation. Our recommendation is that if you want a translated personal book, then translate the word file itself before compiling the personal book. This will make it easier to use in the application as well.

Veli Voipio

I made some tests. In some cases it translates even to Finnish.

Fabian Jovanovic

so good. Thanks!

Fernando-Elías

I understand the need to make strategic decisions. However, it’s misleading to say the service has been “improved” when, in fact, the change appears to prioritize other criterias over quality. Unless users are given the option to choose their preferred translation engine (AI, DeepL, or Google), this cannot truly be considered an improvement. Clarity would be more appreciated than marketing language.

Sorry, but the translation experience has fallen off remarkably. With DeepL you could translate while preserving meaning. The new AI-based translation is not good—it simply doesn’t serve when dealing with elaborate thought or nuanced ideas. Please give users the option to choose the translation engine on a case-by-case basis.

A real example of the problem:

Original text from Logos:

"You can't get second things by putting them first,"
KANG, J. C. – WILLARD, D., Scripture by Heart: Devotional Practices for Memorizing God's Word (Downers Grove, IL 2010).

AI translation into Spanish:

"No puedes obtener las segundas cosas poniendo las primeras primero"

Back-translated literally is:

"You can’t get second things by putting first things first."

But that is not the meaning of the original. “Them” refers to “second things,” and the sentence loses its core logic and point in this AI version.

Please reconsider. This affects the experience for those of us who rely on precise meaning, not just surface-level fluency.

Beloved Amodeo

@Fernando-Elías the general tone of your comment was critical and though I don't agree with you I can see the utility of your opinion. Allowing translation to function more like Text Comparison may improve the experience for some, but for me the result of this move to AI was an improvement. The prior experience was a bit "stiff" and hard to read YMMV. I haven't experimented with resubmitting the text for translation this may effect a change, I don't know.

DMB

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1371634#Comment_1371634

Sounds like options is needed.

Beloved Amodeo

@DMB Parsing @Mark Barnes (Logos) it appears a decision had to be made which service to offer. Mark did mention the most favorable translation offered would not necessarily be AI, so it does appear that it is still possible to offer an option. But, being able to offer a wide range of languages and to experience meaningful results was an improvement.

DMB

@Beloved Amodeo agree. But a Bible app that offers poor Bible translation as its choice seems off the wall.

Beloved Amodeo

The OP's example is from a devotional not a Bible. He has insight because he has facility in both languages. I have been delighted with the results obtained with my foreign language resources thus far. And if I come upon a passage that seems askew I have the forums to come to to address the matter.

MJ. Smith

We shouldn't forget that Logos will implement what they judge to be "best" for the type of material and the languages for the bulk of their users. This does NOT mean that it is the best for what I want translated from/to the languages I want. We need to treat external translation sites as alternatives for specific needs.

TIRIS NICOLAE

Thank you for the update and improvements. However, I noticed that while AI translation works for English to French, for Romanian (and other languages), it still uses Google Translate, which is not accurate enough for theological study.

I purchased Logos 10 with the translation features included—before the MAX subscription or the introduction of AI. Now I also have the MAX subscription, but for Romanian, I still only get Google, which is actually worse than what I had before with DeepL.

You mentioned that Logos 10 users wouldn’t be affected by these changes, but in my case, it clearly feels like a downgrade. Please, if possible, enable AI for Romanian as well, or at least allow users to choose DeepL again for better quality.

For users like me, who rely on translations to understand complex theological texts, this change makes the tool much harder to use.

Thank you for your understanding.

Mark Barnes (Logos)

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1371926#Comment_1371926

Thanks, Tiris.

We have a bug that means some lesser-used language combinations are still using Google Translate. We should get that fixed soon.