How much does a professional translation cost?

Price is counted by the word, not by the page

A page is not a unit: a tightly-set contract page holds 600 words, a presentation slide holds 40. The translation market therefore counts by source word — the words in your document, counted before translation, which makes the quote verifiable.

The orders of magnitude seen in France in 2026 for standard professional documents:

• Translation agency with human translator : 12 to 20 cents excl. VAT per word, 5 to 10 working days, minimum order value often around 40 to 60 €.
• Specialist freelance translator : 8 to 15 cents, turnaround varies depending on their workload.
• Domain-driven language engine, like Manuce: 0.46 to 3.5 cents per word depending on level and volume (0.58 / 1.8 / 3.5 ct in the first bracket), a few minutes, minimum of €3.50 to €12 per language.

On a 6,000-word contract, that's €720 to €1,200 on one side, around €35 (Essential), €107 (Professional) or €207 (Premium) on the other. The gap is not down to the quality of the language produced — it's down to the fact that nobody proofreads line by line with us, and that's exactly what needs saying before selling.

The three things that make the price vary

1. The level of treatment

A text you simply want to understand internally does not call for the same care as a contract you're sending out for signature. At Manuce, three levels: Essential (0.58 ct) faithfully conveys the meaning; Professional (1.8 ct) entrusts the text to the specialist in the field and produces a document ready to send; Premium (3.5 ct) adds cross-checking, source and translation side by side, for what carries weight.

2. The language

Not all languages cost the same, because the available material is not the same. Common languages with Latin script — English, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Dutch — are at the base rate. Other European languages carry a 25% supplement, non-Latin scripts and Asian and Middle Eastern languages 60%, rare languages 100%. The supplement applies in both directions: translating from Chinese costs as much as into Chinese.

3. Volume and number of languages

The rate is tiered from 5,000 words onwards. And the second language costs less than the first: the document is analysed and classified only once. Hence discounts of 20% for two languages, 30% for three, 40% for four, 50% from five onwards.

What quotations don't always say

Three items slip in between the advertised price and the invoice:

• The minimum order. An 80-word certificate is rarely billed at 80 words. Expect €40 to €60 at a translation agency, €3.50 to €12 with us depending on level.
• Reformatting. A PDF or brochure returned as plain text is worthless: you then need someone to rebuild the document. Some charge by the hour. With us, the original layout is included in the per-word price.
• Urgency. The standard urgency supplement ranges from 25 to 50%. It only makes sense where the normal turnaround time is measured in days.

Work out your own estimate in thirty seconds

Open your document and note the word count: Word shows it in the bottom left corner, or under Review → Word Count. Then multiply by the per-word rate, apply the language coefficient and compare with the minimum order. You get an estimate accurate to within 10%.

Or drop the file: the count is based on your actual words, the quotation appears before any payment, and an extract is translated free so you can judge for yourself.

The five lines of a translation quote, decoded

A serious quote fits on five lines, and each one can be checked. Knowing how to read them means you won't compare two offers that aren't for the same thing.

• The word count. Counted in the source file, before translation. Open your Word document, Review menu, Word Count: you should find the same figure, give or take a few units. A significant discrepancy indicates you're being charged for target words, or spaces.
• The price per word. It must be single and displayed. Beware of a "per-page" price: a page has no definition, and switching from one to the other is the simplest way to make a quote incomparable.
• Volume discounting. Beyond a few thousand words, the price per word should decrease. A linear quote for 30,000 words is an expensive quote.
• The minimum order. It's what makes a single page cost 60 € at an agency. It's justified when a human opens the file; it's much less justified otherwise.
• Options. Layout, urgency, additional proofreading, delivery format. Each must be costed separately, otherwise you'll never know what you're paying for.

Why two quotes for the same document vary by a factor of three

Three causes, almost always the same ones.

Specialisation. A legal or medical text is charged 30 to 50% more than a general text, because it requires a translator who knows the subject. That's legitimate — but check that the specialisation being charged actually matches your document. Meeting minutes aren't a legal text just because they mention a contract.

The language pair. French-English is the best-served pair in the world, therefore the least expensive. French-Finnish or French-Thai cost considerably more, and that's true everywhere.

Turnaround time. An express service is charged 30 to 100% more at an agency, because several translators need to work in parallel and then harmonise. If your deadline is in three days, this surcharge is often the largest line on the quote.

The cost no one quotes: reformatting

It's the invisible item in translations, and often the most expensive. A sixteen-page brochure contains fewer than 2,000 words — a few hundred euros of translation — but putting those words back into the layout takes half a day of a designer's time. For a catalogue, it's several days.

Many quotes don't mention this work because it's supposed to remain with the client. You then discover, on delivery, that you've received a Word file of plain text to reintegrate yourself. Ask the question before ordering: will the file come back to me in its original format, laid out?

It's also what explains why a cheap automatic translation sometimes costs more in total than a complete service: the displayed price only covered half the work.

What you should have translated and don't

The most interesting effect of a price drop is not the saving on what you already translate. It is what you do not translate today because the quote exceeds the value.

The most common cases: updates to terms and conditions, which you postpone until the annual overhaul; product sheets for a market you are hesitant to enter; reports you summarise instead of passing on in full; internal documentation from a subsidiary, which stays in French because "everyone understands a bit".

Each of these abandoned translations has a cost, it simply does not appear on any invoice.