Translate a Safety Data Sheet PDF into English

What changes when an SDS goes into English

An SDS is not free prose. Its 16 sections, hazard statements and precautionary statements have standard English wording that health and safety staff recognise at a glance. A translation that is accurate but worded differently stands out to an importer or an auditor.

• Section headings: the French « Rubrique 1 » or German « Abschnitt 1 » becomes SECTION 1: Identification of the substance/mixture and of the company/undertaking.
• H and P statements: H315 reads Causes skin irritation, H319 reads Causes serious eye irritation. The codes themselves never change.
• Signal words: a classic trap. French « Attention » or German « Achtung » must become Warning, not Attention; the stronger word stays Danger.
• Pictograms: they are images in the PDF and stay as they are; only any accompanying labels are translated.

Numbers, dates and spelling: the details that give it away

Section 9 (physical and chemical properties) and section 14 (transport) hold most of the figures, and their notation changes in English:

• Decimal separator: a source value written 23,5 °C becomes Flash point: 23.5 °C. A comma left in place can be misread as a thousands separator.
• Identifiers stay identical: CAS number (64-17-5), EC number and UN number (UN 1170). Check that none has been reformatted.
• Dates: 03/04/2024 means 3 April in the UK and 4 March in the US. Writing the month in words removes the ambiguity.
• Spelling: colourless, odour in British English; colorless, odor in American English. In chemistry, sulfur is the recommended spelling on both sides.
• Plurals: English has one form for 1 and another for everything else (1 component, 3 components), with no special case for zero.

What Manuce returns, and what it does not do

The PDF is read block by block, recording each block’s position, font, size and colour. In the file you get back, the source text is removed and the English placed in the same box, in the original font or an equivalent; logos, pictograms, table borders and background stay in place. English is often shorter than Romance or Germanic source languages (typically 10 to 15% shorter than French), so text usually fits as is; if a table cell overflows, the text size is reduced until it fits.

You also receive an editable Word version, handy for correcting a P statement or updating the revision date, a formatted PDF and plain text.

What is not done:

• a scanned SDS (a page image with no selectable text) is not read;
• no sworn or certified translation is produced;
• the translation renders what is written: it does not swap national exposure limits for UK Workplace Exposure Limits or US PELs, nor replace the emergency phone number or the legislation cited in section 15.

Translation is not regulatory compliance

An SDS for Great Britain falls under UK REACH and GB CLP; one for the United States follows OSHA’s Hazard Communication Standard, which also uses 16 sections. In both cases some sections are country-specific: section 1 (supplier and local emergency number), section 8 (national exposure limits) and section 15 (applicable regulations).

If the sheet is going to an English-speaking customer or subsidiary for information, a translation is often enough. If it must accompany a product placed on the UK or US market, have those sections reviewed by whoever handles regulatory affairs: Occupational exposure limits: MAK 8h 1,000 mg/m³ may be faithful, but it is not what a British or American reader expects to find.

Preparing the sheet and checking the result

1. Test the PDF: try selecting a sentence in section 2. If nothing highlights, the sheet is an image; go back to the supplier’s original file or the software that produced it.
2. Use the free sample: pick a paragraph from section 2 or 4 to judge the vocabulary (skin contact, if swallowed) before paying.
3. Check each H and P statement against the official English wording for its code, especially combined ones such as P305+P351+P338.
4. Review trade names and chemical names that must stay unchanged.
5. Check the figures in section 9 and the dates in headers and footers.

For a sheet you will pass on, the Professional level, handled by the domain specialist, is the right fit; Essential is enough to understand an SDS you have received in another language.

In practice

1. Check that the SDS text can be selected in the PDF.
2. Upload the file: the quote appears based on the exact word count.
3. Read the free sample paragraph, ideally from section 2 or 4.
4. Pay, then download the English PDF, Word file, formatted PDF and plain text.
5. Check H and P statements, figures, dates and sections 1, 8 and 15.