The Role of Translation in the Age of AI

On April 25, 2026, the China Translation Association’s annual conference opened at Wuhan University, themed “Integration and Breaking Barriers: The Infinite Possibilities of Translation in the Digital Age.” Experts from various fields gathered to discuss the high-quality development of the translation industry amidst the AI wave.

The conference released the “2026 China Translation Industry Development Report,” indicating that in 2025, the Chinese translation industry maintained stability during scale adjustments, with a total output value of approximately 70.12 billion yuan. The number of operational translation companies and the quality of practitioners showed steady growth, reaching 6.867 million practitioners, including 1.135 million professional translators.

Civilization is enriched through communication and mutual learning. The “2026 Global Translation Industry Development Report” revealed that the global translation industry has transitioned from a phase of uniform growth to a new stage characterized by differentiation and reconstruction. According to international consulting firms, the estimated size of the global translation market in 2025 is $59.53 billion, reflecting a 7.0% increase from the previous year. The Asian and European markets demonstrated strong growth momentum, with over 60% of overseas orders for Chinese translation companies coming from European clients. In academia, China leads globally in translation research output and the number of research institutions.

Currently, AI is empowering various industries. AI translation is widely applied, and the integration of translation technology has entered a deep fusion stage. The “2026 China Translation Industry Development Report” stated that in 2025, there were 2,183 companies in China focusing on AI translation as their main business, with the human-machine collaborative translation model becoming a basic consensus in the industry. The “2026 Global Translation Industry Development Report” showed a significant increase in the application rate of AI translation and large language models, making them mainstream tools in the translation industry. A 2025 survey of the European language industry indicated that 60% of respondents had used AI translation, and 80% of language service providers had adopted it.

Wang Gangyi, former deputy director of the China Foreign Languages Bureau and executive vice president of the China Translation Association, noted that while AI translation and large language model technologies are advancing, there are still significant shortcomings in language coverage, accuracy, emotional understanding, and expression. Skills in AI-related capabilities and specialized fields are critical demands, and human-machine collaboration has become the mainstream working model. Small and medium-sized language companies and independent practitioners face multiple operational pressures, and under the drive of multimodal technology, specialization and differentiation are key survival strategies.

“Currently, AI technology is profoundly reshaping the global language service and cultural communication landscape,” said Wang Lu, director of the Film Translation Production Center at China Central Television, during the release of the “AI Translation and the New Three Samples of Cultural Export Research Report.” She acknowledged that while AI translation significantly lowers the barriers to cross-language communication and enhances export efficiency, the internationalization process of China’s cultural “new three samples”—represented by online literature, online film and television dramas, and online games—still faces common challenges such as data security, compliance, cultural bias, and balancing quality and cost. She believes that all parties in the industry chain should adopt differentiated, precise, and collaborative development strategies to jointly tackle the challenges of going global and enhance internationalization effectiveness.

During a roundtable dialogue focusing on cross-cultural narratives and new translation paradigms, representatives from emerging enterprises involved in the internationalization of the “new three samples” and scholars from Wuhan University discussed the connotations and contemporary value of Jingchu culture, exploring how to leverage the Yangtze culture as a link to strengthen cultural exports in the digital age.

Culture is the soul of translation work; it requires not only depth of thought but also a humanistic touch. According to Wang Wei, vice president of iFlytek Co., Ltd., while machine translation can convey information relatively completely, it still falls short of the understanding of context and the output of “faithfulness, expressiveness, and elegance” achieved by human translators. Looking to the future, a new ecosystem of multilingual AI translation needs to be co-built by humans and machines.

“The iteration of technology, especially the development of AI, provides us with significant opportunities to enhance our work, strengthen our capabilities, and continually expand the boundaries of translation work,” said Guillaume de Nerfberg, president of the International Federation of Translators, in a video address. He emphasized that under the AI wave, the value of translation will not diminish; rather, its importance will become more pronounced, and the demands on translators will be higher than ever. We need professional language workers more than ever.