Learn how to translate chats in real-time on Apple’s Messages app on iOS 26, as you send and receive them, for easier communication in foreign languages.
The built-in Messages app on the iPhone, iPad, and Mac has long supported translating foreign texts into English—hold a chat bubble and choose the translate option from the floating menu. With iOS 26, Mssages gains the ability to automatically translate incoming and outgoing chats in foreign languages.
Translation is available for SMS, MMS, and iMessages. Though you need an internet connection to download languages, on-the-fly translation in the Messages app works offline thanks to on-device processing. Follow along with the steps below to learn how to use real-time chat translation in Messages on iOS 26 and iPadOS 26.
Automatic translation in Apple Messages
The whole process involves just three easy steps. First, you must download the appropriate language files. Second, you’ll turn on automatic translation. And finally, we’ll show you how to use the feature.
Step 1: Download the offline language
On-device translation requires offline languages. Use Wi-Fi to download them, as each pack can take anywhere between 300 megabytes and one gigabyte of local storage. Downloading languages in the Messages app is buggy on the iOS 26 beta, so these steps will guide you through the same process in the Settings app.
1) Open the Settings app on your iPhone or iPad and navigate to Apps > Translate, then select Downloaded Languages.
2) Tap the downward-pointed arrow next to your native language, like English. Then, tap the same download icon next to the language you want to translate from, such as French. I recommend staying on this screen until the languages have finished downloading and appear in the “Available Offline” section at the top.
Live translation in the Messages app is currently available in English, Chinese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, and Spanish.
Step 2: Turn on automatic translation
Once appropriate offline language files have been downloaded, it’s time to turn on the Auto-Translate option in a chat’s settings within the Messages app.
1) Open an existing conversation in the built-in Messages app on your iPhone or iPad and hit the contact name at the top, then turn on the Automatically Translate switch. Doing so will bring up a panel to choose offline language packs.
2) Check that the language you understand and speak is selected in the “Translate To” field. Tap it to make changes, if necessary. In the ‘Translate From’ section, tap the previously downloaded language to select it and return to the previous screen.
The “Automatically Translate” switch should turn green, and a new “Translate From” option will appear below, listing the foreign language you’d like Messages to translate from. If everything looks fine, tap the back button to return to the chat.
Step 3: Automatically translate foreign chats
Upon returning to the conversation screen, you’ll now see a small pill-shaped “Translating Language” button. This conveys that the message translation feature is active on the device. From now on, when you receive new texts in the chosen foreign language, your device will automatically translate them and display them in the chat bubbles. Existing texts are not translated.
You can tap the pill-shaped “Translating” button and choose to show both the original and translated texts or just the translated version. You can also stop translating. But if you do that and then change your mind, you’ll have to turn this feature back on by re-enabling the Automatically Translate switch.
Multilingual translation
iOS lets you download multiple offline languages, but the Messages app can only translate texts between two languages. If you set it to translate Italian messages to English and receive a text in French, it will not translate it. For multilingual conversations, you can download multiple languages and manually switch between them, as required. Though not ideal, it’s better than nothing.
But what about old messages? Well, live translation in the Messages app doesn’t translate old chats. Instead, you can copy the text and paste it into the built-in Translate app to see a translation.
Translation services in iOS
Translation services are available at the system level in iOS. For example, you can select a piece of text in any app and then hold the selection to bring up the floating menu that includes the Translate option. There’s also Apple’s dedicated Translate app, which has been reinstalled on iPhones and iPads for a few years now.
iOS 26 expands translation capabilities to certain apps. In the Music app, for example, you can translate lyrics into another language. And in the Messages, Phone, and FaceTime apps, live translation is available for both text and audio.
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