Excel language functions

(Originally posted June 27, 2024 By ~ Gedion Alemayehu)

Hello, Microsoft 365 Insiders! I’m Gedion Alemayehu, a Product Manager on the Excel team. I’m excited to announce the release of two new features in Excel for Windows and Excel for Mac: TRANSLATE and DETECTLANGUAGE.

memo: These are preview features. Based on your feedback, their signatures and results may change significantly before they are widely released. Therefore, we recommend that you do not use these features in your critical workbooks until they are generally available.

New translation features in Excel: TRANSLATE and DETECTLANGUAGE

Introducing two new features designed to simplify and automate translation directly within your spreadsheet.

• TRANSLATE() – A function that translates text from one language to another.
• DETECTLANGUAGE() – Function to detect the language of a given text.

Translate

TRANSLATE uses user-supplied text to translate from one language to another. Microsoft Translation Services. Currently supports over 100 languages. For a full list, visit: Supported Languages.

Translation function

The full signature is as follows:

TRANSLATE(text, [source_language], [target_language])&

Learn more

Language detection

DETECTLANGAUGE detects the language of text you provide using Microsoft Translation Services and returns a language code.

DETECTLANGAUGE function

The full signature is as follows:

DETECTLANGUAGE(text)

Learn more

effectiveness

This feature is currently available to Beta channel users running:

• Windows: Version 2407 (Build 16.0.17808.20000) or later
• Mac: 16.87 (Build 24062430) or later

Not yet? It’s probably us, not you.

Features are released over time to ensure everything works smoothly. They are released slowly to a larger number of Insiders, highlighting features you may not have. Sometimes we remove elements based on your feedback to make them even better. This is rare, but we also have the option to completely remove a feature from the product, even if you, as an Insider, have had the opportunity to try it out.

feedback

If you have any feedback or suggestions, please click to submit them.help >feedbackIn Excel.

You can also submit new ideas or vote on other ideas by:Microsoft Feedback.

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