Upload full-size files in 80+ formats — PowerPoint, Word, Excel, XLIFF, audio and video — translate them in one project with shared terminology, and export each one in its original format. Document pricing is by word count, not megabytes.
1,000+ enterprise brands translate their files in Smartcat
Repetitions between files are discounted, file size never enters the bill, and each file exports the way it came in.
The ceilings that are actually published are global, not per format:
6 GB — document and project files
4 GB — reference files
1 GB — translation-memory imports
10 MB — glossary imports
100 MB — non-image PDFs
30 MB per image — OCR
Over a ceiling — or simply for speed above 1 GB — split the file into smaller parts, strip unnecessary embedded media, or compress its images.
No maximum duration is published for audio or video: the constraint is the file's size, not how long it runs, so the question to ask about a three-hour recording is how many gigabytes it is.
There is no cap on how many files one project can hold. Adaptive AI agents apply the same terminology across all 80+ file types.
Smartcat is SOC 2 Type II compliant: files are encrypted in transit and at rest, workspaces are isolated per account, and access is role-based.
Pricing is metered in Smartwords across the whole project — one Smartword per source word — so sixty files cost the same as their words. Two exceptions are worth knowing:
for setup ease
for ease of use
enterprise brands
encrypted in transit and at rest, isolated workspaces, role-based access
A 200 MB deck stuffed with embedded video and screenshots translates only as well as its parts. Text inside those images is a separate image-translation pass — there is no single workflow that does both. Bring the file set that always breaks and have a specialist scope it with you.
Each format behaves a little differently once the files get big.
PowerPoint — decks come back as working decks: slides are rebuilt with layout, images and formatting in place, and speaker notes are translated with the rest. Text inside embedded images is not translated by the deck run and needs a separate image-translation pass.
Word — heavy files translate whole, with styles, headers and footers preserved.
XLIFF — imports accept 1.2 and 2.0 plus SDLXLIFF, MQXLIFF and Articulate/Easygenerator flavours, while exports are XLIFF 1.2 only. Units marked translate="no" stay locked in the editor regardless of import options, and you choose whether a re-import overwrites segments changed in Smartcat.
Video — metered on the words spoken rather than the megabytes, and the workflow covers audio and subtitles only: on-screen and burned-in text is not translated.
One huge PDF — its own case: the ceiling is 100 MB rather than 6 GB, there is no page limit, and scanned pages need the pdfimageonly parsing method selected at upload.
6 GB
ceiling for document and project files
Documentation recommends splitting anything over 1 GB for speed, removing unnecessary embedded media, or compressing images.
100 MB
ceiling for non-image PDFs
No page limit — for hundreds of pages, see the dedicated large-PDF workflow.
80+
file formats in one project
Word, PowerPoint, Excel, PDF, XLIFF, subtitle and video files among them, each exported in its original format.
“Ever since using Smartcat's translation platform, we have increased our project output by 30% using the same resources,” says Gina Groß, eCommerce Team Lead at Wunderman Thompson Commerce Luxembourg — the mixed-format, big-campaign use case this page describes.
Kids2, the family-products manufacturer, cut ecommerce content turnaround by 92% — from 90 minutes to under 5 minutes per Salsify upload — using the Smartcat–Salsify connector.
Up to 70%
lower translation cost
for Stanley Black & Decker, achieving significant savings while boosting translation quality.
31 hours
saved per month
by Babbel’s marketing and L&D teams, streamlining operations significantly.
10 days to 2–3
turnaround per course
achieved by Smith+Nephew, down from an average of ten days with their previous providers.
Upload the whole set, let one glossary keep it consistent, export each file the way it came in. Free for 15 days with 15,000 Smartwords, no credit card.
Upload it to Smartcat at full size, pick source and target languages, and export it back in its original format. Formats include Word, PowerPoint, Excel, PDF, XLIFF, subtitles and video. The published size ceilings are global rather than per format, and there is no cap on how many files you send in one go.
The published ceilings are global rather than per format:
Over a ceiling — or simply for speed above 1 GB — split the file into smaller parts, strip unnecessary embedded media, or compress its images. Price is unaffected by size either way: you pay for words.
What a file is made of matters as much as what it weighs: large pictures, SmartArt and embedded Excel graphs are documented causes of processing failures, so a media-heavy deck is worth thinning before you upload it.
Not as a folder of loose files. ZIP is supported as a package format — IDML, DITA, Articulate Rise SCORM, Articulate Storyline and similar packaged content, where Smartcat detects the package type automatically.
For everything else, upload the files themselves. You can upload multiple at once, and they run as one project sharing a glossary and one writable translation memory per language pair.
Exporting is the reverse: one Download gives you a ZIP of every file in its original format.
By the words spoken, not by file size or duration — so a large, mostly-silent video costs less than a small, talkative one. No maximum duration is published; what a long recording has to satisfy is the file-size ceiling. Subtitles are metered at the standard one Smartword per source word, while AI dubbing is metered at 10× Smartwords per word.
Yes — slides export as a working PPTX with layout, images and formatting in place, and speaker notes are translated with the rest of the text. The images themselves keep their position but their text is not translated by the deck run: that needs a separate image-translation pass and re-insertion.
Yes. Imports accept XLIFF 1.2 and 2.0 plus SDLXLIFF, MQXLIFF and Articulate/Easygenerator flavours, and exports are XLIFF 1.2 — the version most tools support, fully spec-compliant with a few Smartcat attributes added. Units marked translate="no" stay locked in the editor regardless of import options, and you choose whether a re-import overwrites segments changed in Smartcat. Large XLIFF files upload whole — no splitting.
Free tools cap file size or page count — that cap is usually why you're here. Smartcat is free for 15 days with 15,000 Smartwords, full access to translation capabilities and no credit card; after that it's paid, with no permanently free tier.
No. Images embedded in a file are not translated as part of document translation — text inside a screenshot or diagram has to go through image translation separately and be re-inserted, and there is no single automated workflow that handles both. If a file's real content is images of text, start from the image translator instead.
No maximum duration is published. The limit that applies is the file-size ceiling for project files, so the question to ask about a three-hour recording is how many gigabytes it is, not how many hours it runs.
Smartcat is SOC 2 Type II compliant. Files are encrypted in transit and at rest, workspaces are isolated per account, and access is role-based.
The same as their words. Pricing is metered in Smartwords across the whole project, repetitions between files are discounted, and file size never enters the bill. Two exceptions: text inside an image is metered at a flat 1,000 Smartwords per image, and AI dubbing at 10× Smartwords per word.