Last spring Microsoft made a preview edition of Skype’s translation tool available to Windows 8.1 and Windows 10 users. The limitation of the preview edition was that all parties in the call had to install the preview edition. This week Microsoft announced that Skype Translator is now a native part of Skype for Windows. This means that anyone using Skype on a Windows computer will be able to utilize Translator.

Skype Translator will automatically transcribe and translate as you talk. At this time Translator supports Chinese Mandarin, English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese and Spanish. In instant text Skype messaging Translator supports 50 languages.

To use Skype Translator in Windows simply open Skype as usual then click the globe icon in the upper, right corner of the app. If the globe icon isn’t visible, make sure you have updated to the latest version of the app.

Image courtesy of Microsoft PR.

Applications for Education
As demonstrated in the video embedded below, the realtime translation option in Skype will open up more possibilities for connecting classrooms through activities like Mystery Skype.