Cloud Translation client libraries

This page shows how to get started with the Cloud Client Libraries for the Cloud Translation API. Client libraries make it easier to access Google Cloud APIs from a supported language. Although you can use Google Cloud APIs directly by making raw requests to the server, client libraries provide simplifications that significantly reduce the amount of code you need to write.

Read more about the Cloud Client Libraries and the older Google API Client Libraries in Client libraries explained.

Install the client library

C#

nuget install Google.Cloud.Translation.V2

For more information, see Setting Up a C# Development Environment.

Go

go get cloud.google.com/go/translate

For more information, see Setting Up a Go Development Environment.

Java

If you are using Maven, add the following to your pom.xml file. For more information about BOMs, see The Google Cloud Platform Libraries BOM.

<dependencyManagement>
  <dependencies>
    <dependency>
      <groupId>com.google.cloud</groupId>
      <artifactId>libraries-bom</artifactId>
      <version>26.83.0</version>
      <type>pom</type>
      <scope>import</scope>
    </dependency>
  </dependencies>
</dependencyManagement>

<dependencies>
  <dependency>
    <groupId>com.google.cloud</groupId>
    <artifactId>google-cloud-translate</artifactId>
  </dependency>
</dependencies>

If you are using Gradle, add the following to your dependencies:

implementation 'com.google.cloud:google-cloud-translate:2.93.0'

If you are using sbt, add the following to your dependencies:

libraryDependencies += "com.google.cloud" % "google-cloud-translate" % "2.93.0"

If you're using Visual Studio Code or IntelliJ, you can add client libraries to your project using the following IDE plugins:

The plugins provide additional functionality, such as key management for service accounts. Refer to each plugin's documentation for details.

For more information, see Setting Up a Java Development Environment.

Node.js

For more on setting up your Node.js development environment, refer to the Node.js Development Environment Setup Guide.

npm install @google-cloud/translate

For more information, see Setting Up a Node.js Development Environment.

PHP

composer require google/cloud-translate

For more information, see Using PHP on Google Cloud.

Python

For more on setting up your Python development environment, refer to the Python Development Environment Setup Guide.

pip install google-cloud-translate==2.0.1

For more information, see Setting Up a Python Development Environment.

Ruby

For more on setting up your Ruby development environment, refer to the Ruby Development Environment Setup Guide.

gem install google-cloud-translate-v2

For more information, see Setting Up a Ruby Development Environment.

Set up authentication

To authenticate calls to Google Cloud APIs, client libraries support Application Default Credentials (ADC); the libraries look for credentials in a set of defined locations and use those credentials to authenticate requests to the API. With ADC, you can make credentials available to your application in a variety of environments, such as local development or production, without needing to modify your application code.

For production environments, the way you set up ADC depends on the service and context. For more information, see Set up Application Default Credentials.

For a local development environment, you can set up ADC with the credentials that are associated with your Google Account:

Install the Google Cloud CLI. After installation, initialize the Google Cloud CLI by running the following command:
```
gcloud init
```
If you're using an external identity provider (IdP), you must first sign in to the gcloud CLI with your federated identity.
If you're using a local shell, then create local authentication credentials for your user account:
```
gcloud auth application-default login
```
You don't need to do this if you're using Cloud Shell.

If an authentication error is returned, and you are using an external identity provider (IdP), confirm that you have signed in to the gcloud CLI with your federated identity.

A sign-in screen appears. After you sign in, your credentials are stored in the local credential file used by ADC.

Use the client library

The following example shows how to use the client library.

Go

import (
	"context"
	"fmt"
	"io"

	"cloud.google.com/go/translate"
	"golang.org/x/text/language"
)

// translateText translates the given text into the specified targetLanguage. sourceLanguage
// is optional. If empty, the API will attempt to detect the source language automatically.
// targetLanguage and sourceLanguage should follow ISO 639 language code of the input text
// (e.g., 'fr' for French)
//
// Find a list of supported languages and codes here:
// https://cloud.google.com/translate/docs/languages#nmt
func translateText(w io.Writer, targetLanguage, sourceLanguage, text string) error {
	ctx := context.Background()

	// Create new Translate client.
	client, err := translate.NewClient(ctx)
	if err != nil {
		return fmt.Errorf("translate.NewClient error: %w", err)
	}
	defer client.Close()

	// Get required tag by parsing the target language.
	targetLang, err := language.Parse(targetLanguage)
	if err != nil {
		return fmt.Errorf("language.Parse: %w", err)
	}

	options := &translate.Options{}

	if sourceLanguage != "" {
		sourceLang, err := language.Parse(sourceLanguage)
		if err != nil {
			return fmt.Errorf("language.Parse: %w", err)
		}
		options = &translate.Options{
			Source: sourceLang,
		}
	}

	// Find more information about translate function here:
	// https://pkg.go.dev/cloud.google.com/go/translate#Client.Translate
	resp, err := client.Translate(ctx, []string{text}, targetLang, options)
	if err != nil {
		return fmt.Errorf("client.Translate error: %w", err)
	}
	if len(resp) == 0 {
		return fmt.Errorf("client.Translate returned empty response to text: %s", text)
	}

	// Print results to buffer.
	fmt.Fprintf(w, "Input Text: %s\n", resp[0].Text)
	fmt.Fprintf(w, "Translated Test: %s\n", text)

	return nil
}

Java

// TODO(developer): Uncomment these lines.
// import com.google.cloud.translate.*;
// Translate translate = TranslateOptions.getDefaultInstance().getService();

Translation translation = translate.translate("¡Hola Mundo!");
System.out.printf("Translated Text:\n\t%s\n", translation.getTranslatedText());

Node.js

// Imports the Google Cloud client library
const {Translate} = require('@google-cloud/translate').v2;

// Creates a client
const translate = new Translate();

/**
 * TODO(developer): Uncomment the following lines before running the sample.
 */
// const text = 'The text to translate, e.g. Hello, world!';
// const target = 'The target language, e.g. ru';

async function translateText() {
  // Translates the text into the target language. "text" can be a string for
  // translating a single piece of text, or an array of strings for translating
  // multiple texts.
  let [translations] = await translate.translate(text, target);
  translations = Array.isArray(translations) ? translations : [translations];
  console.log('Translations:');
  translations.forEach((translation, i) => {
    console.log(`${text[i]} => (${target}) ${translation}`);
  });
}

translateText();

PHP

use Google\Cloud\Translate\TranslateClient;

/**
 * @param string $text The text to translate.
 * @param string $targetLanguage Language to translate to.
 */
function translate(string $text, string $targetLanguage): void
{
    /** Uncomment and populate these variables in your code */
    // $text = 'The text to translate.';
    // $targetLanguage = 'ja';  // Language to translate to

    $translate = new TranslateClient();
    $result = $translate->translate($text, [
        'target' => $targetLanguage,
    ]);
    print("Source language: $result[source]\n");
    print("Translation: $result[text]\n");
}

Python

def translate_text(
    text: str | bytes | list[str] = "¡Hola amigos y amigas!",
    target_language: str = "en",
    source_language: str | None = None,
) -> dict:
    """Translates a given text into the specified target language.

    Find a list of supported languages and codes here:
    https://cloud.google.com/translate/docs/languages#nmt

    Args:
        text: The text to translate. Can be a string, bytes or a list of strings.
              If bytes, it will be decoded as UTF-8.
        target_language: The ISO 639 language code to translate the text into
                         (e.g., 'en' for English, 'es' for Spanish).
        source_language: Optional. The ISO 639 language code of the input text
                         (e.g., 'fr' for French). If None, the API will attempt
                         to detect the source language automatically.

    Returns:
        A dictionary containing the translation results.
    """

    from google.cloud import translate_v2 as translate

    translate_client = translate.Client()

    if isinstance(text, bytes):
        text = [text.decode("utf-8")]

    if isinstance(text, str):
        text = [text]

    # If a string is supplied, a single dictionary will be returned.
    # In case a list of strings is supplied, this method
    # will return a list of dictionaries.

    # Find more information about translate function here:
    # https://cloud.google.com/python/docs/reference/translate/latest/google.cloud.translate_v2.client.Client#google_cloud_translate_v2_client_Client_translate
    results = translate_client.translate(
        values=text,
        target_language=target_language,
        source_language=source_language
    )

    for result in results:
        if "detectedSourceLanguage" in result:
            print(f"Detected source language: {result['detectedSourceLanguage']}")

        print(f"Input text: {result['input']}")
        print(f"Translated text: {result['translatedText']}")
        print()

    return results

Additional resources

C#

The following list contains links to more resources related to the client library for C#:

Go

The following list contains links to more resources related to the client library for Go:

Java

The following list contains links to more resources related to the client library for Java:

Node.js

The following list contains links to more resources related to the client library for Node.js:

PHP

The following list contains links to more resources related to the client library for PHP:

Python

The following list contains links to more resources related to the client library for Python:

Ruby

The following list contains links to more resources related to the client library for Ruby:

Cloud Translation client libraries Stay organized with collections Save and categorize content based on your preferences.

Install the client library

C#

Go

Java

Node.js

PHP

Python

Ruby

Set up authentication

Use the client library

Go

Java

Node.js

PHP

Python

Additional resources

C#

Go

Java

Node.js

PHP

Python

Ruby

Cloud Translation client libraries