Online Course Translation

Why it helps

Re-recording a course in another language takes weeks and a fluent presenter. Translating each lesson's audio keeps your screen recordings, slides and on-camera segments exactly as produced.

Step by step

1. Export each lesson as its own MP4 — short lessons are easier to review than one long file.
2. Translate a single lesson first and review it with a native speaker for terminology.
3. Process the rest of the module, then upload the translated MP4s and VTT captions to your platform.

Tips

• Keep a glossary of your course's key terms; check them in each translated transcript.
• Course marketplaces typically accept SRT; self-hosted players and many LMSs prefer VTT. You get both.
• On-screen text in slides isn't translated — consider bilingual slides for key diagrams.

Example

Cost: 6,000 credits ($6.00).

Limitations to know

• On-screen text and slide content are not translated.
• Very short lessons are billed at the 2-minute minimum each.

Roll out one lesson before the whole module

The costliest mistake in course translation is dubbing forty lessons and then discovering a terminology problem in all of them. Pick one representative lesson, one with your core vocabulary and some screen recording, and take it all the way through: translate, review, upload to a hidden or draft lesson on your platform, and watch it as a learner would. Only then process the rest. Working module by module also means early learners in the new language can start while later modules are still being reviewed.

The pilot also tells you how well your recording style survives translation. Lessons that lean on "click here, then this one" become hard to follow once the voice no longer lines up with the cursor, and in-jokes or wordplay rarely make it across. If you are still recording later modules, adjust as you go: name the button you are clicking, pause briefly between steps, and read out any text you type on screen, because the narration is the only part that gets translated. Making videos translation-ready lists more habits like these.

Who does what

Even a solo creator plays several roles, and naming them helps once you bring in help.

Instructor

Supplies the glossary of course terms and decides which lessons are worth dubbing and which only need subtitles.

Reviewer

A native speaker of the target language who reads the translated text, ideally someone who knows the subject. Finding a reviewer covers where to look.

Producer

Exports lessons, runs translations, names files consistently and uploads videos and caption files.

Course admin

Translates the landing page, lesson titles, quizzes and emails that sit outside the videos.

A one-page translation style guide, listing terms to leave untranslated, preferred renderings and formal or informal address, saves the reviewer from deciding the same thing in every lesson.

Short lessons and the two-minute minimum

Dubbing is billed at 50 credits per minute with a two-minute minimum per file, so the shape of your course affects the bill.

45-second welcome clip

Billed as 2 minutes: 100 credits (10¢)

6-minute concept lesson

300 credits (30¢)

25-minute walkthrough

1,250 credits ($1.25)

31 lessons totalling 3 hours 20 minutes

About 10,000 credits ($10.00) per language, plus a little extra for clips under two minutes

Tiny clips can be cheaper to caption than to dub: a transcript-mode run costs 1 credit per minute with a 5-credit minimum, so translated captions alone may suit intros and recap clips.

What lives outside the video

A dubbed lesson only translates what is spoken. Learners in the new language will also meet:

• Slides, diagrams and code shown in the picture, which stay in the original language. Bilingual slides or a narrated description help; see translating text that appears in videos.
• Quizzes, downloadable PDFs, assignments and certificates.
• The course landing page, lesson titles and marketing emails.
• Caption files: the VTT from each run suits self-hosted players and many LMSs, as the VTT generator page explains, while marketplaces usually take the SRT.

Each lesson's transcript can also become a written version of the course, which gives learners who prefer reading another way in; course videos to written lessons shows how. Wider design advice is in accessible online courses.

Keeping translated lessons current

Courses change: a tool updates its interface, a price moves, a lesson gets re-recorded. Because each lesson is its own file, you only re-translate the lessons that changed: re-export, re-run, review the new parts and replace the video and captions. Keep a simple sheet listing each lesson, its version date and the date of its translation in each language, so drift is visible at a glance. When a change is small, such as one corrected sentence in a long lesson, it can be cheaper to cut the re-recorded segment out as its own short file, translate that, and splice it into the translated lesson in your editor. Updating translated videos goes further, and lecture translation covers the same material from the student's side.

Using the tool on this page

• The spoken language is detected automatically; you select the output language — the spoken language itself for an untranslated transcript, or another language for a translation. Files can be up to 2 hours long.
• Only the audio is sent for processing — the video stays on your device — and audio and text are deleted within 30 minutes of delivery (how files are protected).
• You can download a translated video that keeps your music and effects, the translated audio as M4A, a transcript and subtitles (SRT and VTT). Every output, step and limit is explained on the video translator page.