Translator engines

Machine translation is optional. You can import, edit and export catalogs without calling a remote API.

Configure Translate.engine with a class implementing EngineInterface, or an ordered array of classes. translate() uses the first non-null result; suggest() collects results from all configured engines. Successful results are cached in the database per engine, input text and language pair. Null results are retried on a later lookup. Changing provider configuration does not automatically refresh an existing cached suggestion.

Included engines

Engine	Integration
Translate\Translator\Engine\Google	Unofficial Google endpoint used by default. Availability and quotas are not guaranteed.
Translate\Translator\Engine\GoogleTranslate	Internal helper used by Google; this is not an EngineInterface class and cannot be configured as an engine.
Translate\Translator\Engine\Yandex	Legacy Yandex SDK integration using Yandex.key; requires yandex/translate-api.
Translate\Translator\Engine\Transltr	Legacy Transltr endpoint; service availability is not guaranteed.

Do not rely on historical free-service quota claims. Verify current provider terms and configure an engine suitable for your deployment. Text submitted for machine translation is sent to that provider.

Custom engine

Create src/Translator/Engine/MyEngine.php:

namespace App\Translator\Engine;

use Translate\Translator\EngineInterface;

class MyEngine implements EngineInterface
{
    public function translate(string $text, string $to, string $from): ?string
    {
        // Replace this with your provider call and return its translated text.
        return null;
    }
}

Configure the class:

'Translate' => [
    'engine' => \App\Translator\Engine\MyEngine::class,
],

Return null when no translation is available. Handle provider errors inside the engine and log useful diagnostics without exposing credentials.

The Google and Transltr providers require the PHP cURL extension. Requests have a 5-second connection timeout and a 15-second total timeout. The bundled GoogleTranslate helper retains its GPL license notice; see its source.