Kagi Translate
Ranked 2 of 4 translation services by recommenders
Shoppers like its multiple translations, formality control and fun output styles. Common caveat: recent limits or extra charges on the translate feature.
Shoppers like its multiple translations, formality control and fun output styles. Common caveat: recent limits or extra charges on the translate feature.
76 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 50
- criticize it
- 26
- approval share
- 66%
Recommended in 6 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: not recommended
- February 2026: not recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: not recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 50 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 1.9 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, not met.
- Recommended in 6 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Fun, funny output styles
“Always good to see sophisticated humour like this.”
Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language” “Try the "Reddit speak", it's actually pretty good.”
Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language” “Otherwise, pretty cool and funny project!”
Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language” - Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language”
- Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language”
- Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language”
- Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language”
- Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language”
- Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language”
Strong translation quality overall
“you can use services like Kagi Translate or DeepL to see the evidence for yourself that they make excellent translations”
Comment from 20 Nov 2025 in “AI is a front for consolidation of resources and power” “Kagi translate is superior to Google translate, also.”
Comment from 22 Jul 2026 in “Back to Kagi” “kagi's caught the spirit of the text perfectly”
Comment from 21 Aug 2026 in “Kagi added a setting for removing paywalled links from search results” - Comment from 12 May 2026 in “All Those A.I. Note Takers? They're Making Lawyers Nervous”
- Comment from 21 Mar 2026 in “Meta's Omnilingual MT for 1,600 Languages”
- Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language”
Useful for corporate speak
“I chose "Telling you how it is cut the crap" and fed it some corp speak from other comments and it did pretty well.”
Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language” “I am putting it to my bookmarks for responding to daily corporate crap”
Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language” “This would save me a lot of time translating politicians”
Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language” - Comment from 19 Mar 2026 in “Love of corporate bullshit is correlated with bad judgment”
Frequently used by subscribers
“I use Translate, Assistant, Universal Summarizer, and (of course) Search multiple times a day.”
Comment from 21 Nov 2025 in “Kagi Assistants” “their Translate (which I use quite often while I'm learning German/working in German”
Comment from 18 Mar 2026 in “Kagi is contemplating the removal of the assistant from its professional tier” “nowadays I’m very happy with Kagi translate”
Comment from 12 May 2026 in “All Those A.I. Note Takers? They're Making Lawyers Nervous” - Comment from 10 Sep 2026 in “Kagi Translate Is Back”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Translate access limited or extra cost
“I'm more bewildered that they've limited our service as paying customers, restricting Kagi Translate.”
Comment from 10 Sep 2026 in “Kagi Translate Is Back” “I'd rather not double my monthly subscription just to have (usable)access to kagi translate.”
Comment from 10 Sep 2026 in “Kagi Translate Is Back” “I expect some amount of translation access as part of my Kagi subscription.”
Comment from 3 Jul 2026 in “Kagi Changelog (July 2): Heads, tails, and an AI toggle” - Comment from 10 Sep 2026 in “Kagi Translate Is Back”
Slow, buggy, or unreliable at times
“it is kind of fiddly and needs refreshing a few times”
Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language” “Which is a very bad translation! unfortunately it looks like the API is somewhat unreliable at the moment”
Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language” “consistently dog slow (paid account) compared to google translate”
Comment from 18 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language” - Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language”
Thin wrapper around an LLM
“Kagi's implementation just looks like a cheap magic trick once you look behind the curtain.”
Comment from 18 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language” “It is just a proooomt. Any shitty LLM can do this.”
Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language” “it’s a fairly trivial wrapper around an LLM”
Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language” Weaker in reverse translation
“Slightly disappointed that translating in the opposite direction doesn’t mention ass at all, much less 5000 times.”
Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language” “It is bad at reverse direction though”
Comment from 17 Mar 2026 in “Kagi Translate now supports LinkedIn Speak as an output language”
Other translation services people recommend
The three most recommended other translation services, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Google Translate | 64 | 66 | 49% | 12 | 11 yrs5 owners | — |
| Kagi TranslateThis page | 50 | 26 | 66% | 6 | — | — |
| Firefox Translations | 26 | 4 | 87% | 9 | — | Approved |
| DeepL Translator | 25 | 13 | 66% | 11 | — | — |
What people said
40 of the 77 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“Why can't the AI budget be shared with translate?”
“I'm more bewildered that they've limited our service as paying customers, restricting Kagi Translate.”
“I'd rather not double my monthly subscription just to have (usable)access to kagi translate.”
“has become my most used Kagi product”
“I'm happy with this change. I love Kagi but don't use the translate feature enough to warrant being charged extra for it.”
“I think Kagi's product team actually uses their own software.”
“kagi's caught the spirit of the text perfectly”
“Kagi translate is superior to Google translate, also.”
“I expect some amount of translation access as part of my Kagi subscription.”
“the "harness" around it forces you to use it only to improve your text, not sloppify it”
“nowadays I’m very happy with Kagi translate”
“Kagi Translate is fantastic.”
“we have a tool to generate these more easily”
“consistently dog slow (paid account) compared to google translate”
“Kagi's implementation just looks like a cheap magic trick once you look behind the curtain.”
“their Translate (which I use quite often while I'm learning German/working in German”
“it’s a fairly trivial wrapper around an LLM”
“It will imitate anyone. Impressive.”
“This is kinda fun, bookmarked.”
“I am putting it to my bookmarks for responding to daily corporate crap”
“it is kind of fiddly and needs refreshing a few times”
“The page doesn't seem to translate anything in Firefox.”
“it's even more funny than I expected”
“Not too shabby. Weird that it just repeated it in the first paragraph but then understood it in the second one.”
“Which is a very bad translation! unfortunately it looks like the API is somewhat unreliable at the moment”
“Otherwise, pretty cool and funny project!”
“I chose "Telling you how it is cut the crap" and fed it some corp speak from other comments and it did pretty well.”
“Slightly disappointed that translating in the opposite direction doesn’t mention ass at all, much less 5000 times.”
“Try the "Reddit speak", it's actually pretty good.”
“Always good to see sophisticated humour like this.”
“Truly anything goes. Tried gen-z-slang”
“This would save me a lot of time translating politicians”
“It is just a proooomt. Any shitty LLM can do this.”
“It is bad at reverse direction though”
“This is actually great, lol.”
“Had lots of fun when this first came out”
“pretty good if you ask me”
“I do appreciate that Kagi Translate provides multiple translations and attempts to explain their differences in connotation”
“I use Translate, Assistant, Universal Summarizer, and (of course) Search multiple times a day.”
“you can use services like Kagi Translate or DeepL to see the evidence for yourself that they make excellent translations”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.