Google Acquires Word Lens, Will Integrate It With Google Translate

If you have not heard of the Words Lens app, it’s probably one you’ll want to download onto your smartphone right away. It’s basically a translation app that has the uncanny ability to look at signboards and translates the foreign text into English (or whatever other language) for you, so that you will understand what it says.

It’s incredibly handy, especially if you’re overseas and you have no idea what the signboards are telling you. That being said, given its translation capabilities, the company behind the app, Quest Visual, has announced that they are being acquired by Google, which will see their technology make its way into Google Translate.

Now the good news is that the app appears to be sticking around for now, and hopefully that will remain. Given that Google isn’t really the type that kills off their acquisitions (think apps like Snapseed), there is a good chance that Word Lens will continue being available for sometime to come – either that or its features get integrated into the Google Translate app, which we guess wouldn’t be the end of the world.

To celebrate this acquisition, Quest Visual has also announced that for a limited time, the language packs are free for download. Previously users had to pay for the language packs (the app itself was free), so if you have yet to check it out, you can hit up the iTunes App Store or the Google Play Store for the download.

Tyler Lee
Categories: Cellphones
Tags: Apps, Google