How to translate web pages

You can view this article in Ukrainian using Google Translate.

There are a few ways of doing this, but I will show you a universal method that should work on your computer, tablet and mobile phone. The method I describe, should also work on your Windows or IOS (Apple) device.

Steps to translate a web page

For this demonstration, we will use the official UK Government’s Ukraine Sponsorship Scheme (Homes for Ukraine) page, which on the date this article was published, only existed in English. Go to this web page now.

Please note all the screenshot images shown below can be clicked or touched to show a larger image. If you are viewing this page on a narrow screen, for instance on your mobile phone, you should see larger images if you hold your device horizontally.

Once you have the web page displayed in your browser, copy the web address to your clipboard. The method of doing this varies according to the device you are using.

Once you have copied the web address to your clipboard, go to translate.google.com and follow the instructions shows below:

1. Select the “DETECT LANGUAGE” option, as shown in the screenshot below
2. Paste in the web address you have just copied to your clipboard. Google Translate will automatically fill in the web address to the right, as shown in the image below
3. Choose your language for translation
4. Click or touch the blue icon to translate the web page

Example of how to translate web pages into Ukrainian

The annotated screenshot below demonstrates how to translate web pages into Ukrainian:

Google Translate will now show you the page translated into Ukrainian, or the language you chose in Step 3 above.

Example of web page translated into Ukrainian

Once you are on the translated page, you can follow any links found on the page, and Google Translate will continue showing all followed pages translated into Ukrainian.

Please note that Google Translate cannot translate words published as images instead of text. In this example, the words Homes for Ukraine remain in English because they have been published as an image.

Important points to note

Google Translate records your IP* address every time you use the service. If you use Google Translate too many times, Google may lock you out of the service and show you this error:

*IP address, otherwise known as an internet protocol address.

Example of the error you may encounter

For accessibility purposes, the text in the above image, is transcribed below:

About this page. Our systems have detected unusual traffic from your computer network. This page checks to see if it’s really you sending the requests and not a robot. Why did this happen? IP address: redacted. Time: redacted. URL: redacted.

As far as I know, there is no workaround for this. The only thing you can do is wait before trying again. In my experience, I have had to wait around 10 minutes before the service starts working again.

Please bear in mind that Google Translate is a computerised translation service. This means that the translated page you see may not always convey the original meaning intended by the author.

You can also translate some file types using Google Translate

The Google Translate service allows you to upload documents for translation with the following file extensions:

.docx, .pdf, .pptx, or .xlsx.

To use this service, select the Documents tab once you are on the Google Translate page. Then follow the instructions to upload your document and download the translated version.

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