# Best offline translator?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-offline-translator/605899>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [December 12, 2011, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-offline-translator/605899 "2011-12-12T13:22:13Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Thinktank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Thinktank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thinktank)\
**Post date:** [December 12, 2011, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-offline-translator/605899/1 "2011-12-12T13:22:13Z")

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HI,  
I’m going on a trip Wednesday to Poland. I find Google translate has the best translation of most things I write, however I don’t expect there to be wireless in the house. I’d like to bring a netbook with me and write things to communicate with the parents should I have a need to.

I know about Google Translate Client but I’m still not sure if this is like have Google Translate locally on my desktop.

Can anyone chime-in about the best offline translation apps out there? It kinda makes or breaks the over-all mood of a trip based on how much you can communicate with them.

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**Author:** ![Thinktank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Thinktank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thinktank)\
**Post date:** [December 12, 2011, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-offline-translator/605899/2 "2011-12-12T21:37:39Z")

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Sorry, forgive the bump, but really need to find some answers in a short time.

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**Author:** ![dzero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/5f9b8f/32.png) [@dzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dzero)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2011, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-offline-translator/605899/3 "2011-12-13T00:12:31Z")

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You probably won’t be interested, but I think there are real time translation apps for iPhone. I don’t have any experience with them though.

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**Author:** ![Thinktank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Thinktank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thinktank)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2011, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-offline-translator/605899/4 "2011-12-13T14:45:32Z")

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Yeah I saw those Dzero, but my phone is far from “smart” heh… I also looked at Systran but I find it doesn’t do as good of a job with Polish as Google translate. I’m having a quite a problem contacting Google also -only to ask if their Google translate client app truly works in a desktop format (as in offline)  
Umm- help?