My friends here who have German als Muttersprache, what is your opinion about ggle tranlator? I know it's not accurate sometimes, I see it when I translate from Arabic to English. But from German to English (vice versa) I still can't trust it... Am I right?
Just asking to know If I can rely on it when I need to know a new word in German. And If you know an alternative I appreciate if you mentioned it.

Question

My friends here who have German als Muttersprache, what is your opinion about ggle tranlator? I know it's not accurate sometimes, I see it when I translate from Arabic to English. But from German to English (vice versa) I still can't trust it... Am I right?
Just asking to know If I can rely on it when I need to know a new word in German. And If you know an alternative I appreciate if you mentioned it.

ElGrande8 · Answer

ich finde die Übersetzungen Deutsch Englisch und umgekehrt gar nicht so schlecht.
Wirklich sensationell finde ich daß er mir Chinesisch und Japanisch in sinnvolle Deutsche Sätze übersetzt.Ich bin eigentlich recht zufrieden und ich vermute daß er noch viel besser wird weil sie daran arbeiten

Kimberson · Answer

It has its issues, like every automatic translation. You cannot rely on it 100% because there is always the chance that it misses a figurative meaning or picks the wrong translation if a word can be translated several ways.
I've sometimes used Google translate from a foreign language to German, then the same foreign language to English, and I found that the English translation was often better. It seems Google are better at maintaining their "home turf" language English.
Should you use it? Well, sure, but be smart about it. I suggest using it like this:
- when the alternative to using it would be zero/very little understanding of a text or communication with someone else
- if you understand the foreign language well: when you need a text version where you can spot and correct the errors yourself

Otherwise, if you paste whole letters into Google translate and use the machine translation, it might sound clumsy to a recipient. If you want to make a good impression, it's better to learn the language.

A great alternative to Google translate is Deepl. It can often recognize if a text is from a specific technical domain and pick the right translation and sentence structure e.g. for instructions. It's not perfect, either, but a few times now I've been quite  impressed with its translations of whole manuals or cooking recipes I pasted into it.

ich finde die Übersetzungen Deutsch Englisch und umgekehrt gar nicht so schlecht.Wirklich sensationell finde ich daß er mir Chinesisch und Japanisch in sinnvolle Deutsche Sätze übersetzt.Ich bin eigentlich recht zufrieden und ich vermute daß er noch viel besser wird weil sie daran arbeiten

ich finde die Übersetzungen Deutsch Englisch und umgekehrt gar nicht so schlecht.
Wirklich sensationell finde ich daß er mir Chinesisch und Japanisch in sinnvolle Deutsche Sätze übersetzt.Ich bin eigentlich recht zufrieden und ich vermute daß er noch viel besser wird weil sie daran arbeiten