Twitter Receives In-Line Tweet Translations Courtesy Of Bing

Twitter is now making it easier for you to discern tweets that are written in a foreign language. Facebook has long included the ability to see foreign translations in-line with posts, so it’s nice to see that Twitter has finally jumped onboard. And it only makes sense that Twitter would add this functionality, as nearly 80 percent of active users live outside of the United States.

The new translation feature is powered by Microsoft’s Bing Translator and must first be enabled within your Account settings. Once enabled, when you stumble across a tweet that is in a foreign language — and you see a Globe icon within the tweet — you can click the tweet to expand it, displaying the English translation (or whichever language you currently have set as your default).

While the Bing Translator should help you understand the gist of a tweet, it isn’t perfect. “The results still vary and often fall below the accuracy and fluency of translations provided by a professional translator,” Twitter explains. “For this reason, the original text is always displayed above its translation.”

Tweet translations are currently available for 40 language pairs and can be used via Twitter.com, TweetDeck along with the official Twitter apps for iOS and Android.

The inclusion of Bing Translate comes right after the announcement of Twitter’s new “While you were away” feature which presents you with popular tweets that you may have missed while you taking a break from the service.