MC
Morning! The beta build is up. Can everyone test the new sync before lunch?
transparent
A pane of glass that translates whatever it covers.
Lay it over any app on your Mac. The text underneath changes language in place, and the app stays exactly as it was.
- InstantTranslated as fast as you can read it.
- Private, on your MacNothing leaves your Mac unless you say so.
- Click straight throughType, scroll and click underneath as usual.
- Your choice of modelApple on-device, or any model with your key.
From the Latin trans, “across”: the root of both translate and transparent.
Live demo
Drag the glass.
Below is a team chat in Chinese. Move the pane over it, resize it from the corner, and pick a language from the bar. Names stay as they are; everything else changes.
# launchEverything for the 2.4 release
Today
JW
On it. Sync on my big library took 40 seconds instead of 90.
PN
Found one issue: pinned notes jump to the bottom after a restart.
👀 23 replies
LM
Here's the plan from this morning's whiteboard:
Message #launch
This page fakes the reading step with prepared translations. The Mac app reads the real text of whatever window is under the glass and translates it as you go.
Use cases
Wherever the text is.
A chat, a form, a PDF, a game. If it is on your screen, the glass can sit on it.
The ones people ask about first.
Slack
Discord
Microsoft Teams
WhatsApp
Telegram
LINE
WeChat
Signal
KakaoTalk
Messenger
Reddit
Lark
Notion
Figma
Linear
ChatGPT
Claude
and almost any other Mac app
App names and icons are trademarks of their owners. Transparent is an independent app and isn't affiliated with any of them.
21:02, guild chat
Group chat
Slack, Teams, Discord, WeChat. The others keep writing in their language; you read the channel in yours.
Tax season
Software you can't read
Banking, tax and government apps, or the company tool that only comes in one language. Every label and form, in yours.
Sunday
PDFs and papers
Put the glass over a PDF and read it in your language as you scroll. No export, no upload, no waiting for the whole document.
Ranked match
Game chat, as it comes in
Park the glass over the chat corner before the match. Whatever they type, you read it while it still matters.
Release day
Games and visual novels
Text in games is read from the screen and translated where it appears, so titles that were never localized are playable.
Forwarded
Screenshots and images
A screenshot in a chat, a scanned page, a diagram someone shared. Text inside pictures is translated in place too.
Join the waitlistmacOS 15 or later
How it behaves
Everything stays where it was.
The glass changes the language of what is under it and nothing else: not the layout, not the app, not what you were doing.
No steps
Done before you finish reading
No selecting, no copying, no switching apps, no spinner. Whatever is under the glass is already in your language, and stays that way as the page changes.
Click-through
Takes no clicks
The glass takes no clicks. Type in the box under it, scroll, press buttons; the translation follows along.
Scrolling
Keeps pace with the page
Translations move with the app's own text while you scroll. The glass re-reads the app ten times a second, so new text is caught as it appears.
Hover · select · copy
Shows the original on hover
Rest on any translation to see the original underneath it. Select and copy translations like normal text.
Rules
Follows your rules
Skip images, input fields or code. Keep names and your own terms exactly as written.
Engines and privacy
Instant by default. Your own model when you want it.
Default · instant
Apple, on your Mac
The translation models built into macOS: a paragraph is translated in less time than it takes to read it. Text never leaves your computer, and it costs nothing.
- Network
- None after the language download
- Account
- Not needed
Your own
Any model you connect
An OpenAI-compatible or Anthropic endpoint with your own key, the model picked from the provider's list. Slower than on-device, and sometimes worth it for the wording.
- Key
- Yours, kept in your Keychain
- Sent
- The paragraphs under the glass, nothing else
macOS 15 or laterApple silicon and Intel.
Accessibility permissionSo Transparent can read the text of the app under the glass.
Screen Recording, for pictures and gamesOnly used where there is no text to read: pictures, games, scans. You can skip it if you don't need those.
Languages
Ten languages now. Ten more next.
Translate into any of these, from any language the engine can read. The first ten run on your Mac today; the next ten are being added.
Available now
简体中文繁體中文日本語한국어EspañolFrançaisDeutschPortuguêsРусскийEnglish
Coming next
العربيةNederlandsहिन्दीBahasa IndonesiaItalianoPolskiไทยTürkçeУкраїнськаTiếng Việt
Get Transparent first.
Transparent is in private testing on macOS. Leave your email and we'll write once, when it's ready for you.