Microsoft rolls out support for language interpretation on Teams

SAN FRANCISCO: With an aim to make it more user-friendly, tech giant Microsoft has announced that its Teams meeting attendees can now have an interpreter in their preferred language.

The feature has been in testing for quite some time but is now generally available.
Meeting participants can set their preferred language and then listen to a meeting in that language, reports WindowsCentral.

The feature allows meeting organisers to have professional interpreters translate meetings in real-time. Attendees can set their preferred language when they join a meeting and should hear the interpreter's translation at a louder volume than the speaker.

Microsoft outlined the key features of language interpretation, which include listening to a meeting in the language they are most comfortable using, collaborating in meetings where multiple languages are spoken, etc.

As per the report, language interpretation joined a growing list of Teams features to overcome language barriers. For example, Teams also supports translating typed messages.

"Here at Microsoft, we serve a diverse set of global customers, including governmental institutions that hold parliament meetings in multiple languages, multinational and multilingual corporations, businesses that work with vendors around the world, and many more," Microsoft's Shalendra Chhabra, was quoted as saying.

"This feature was built to support customers and users who need to communicate in the virtual world across languages," Chhabra added.

A Microsoft support document breaks down how to organise a meeting with language interpretation, how to add interpreters, how to choose a language, and how to designate someone as an interpreter.

Meeting organisers have to provide their own interpreters. Up to 16 interpreter pairs can be added to any given meeting. The feature works in scheduled meetings, channel meetings, meetings with up to 1,000 people, and webinars.