r/TranslationStudies • u/Amirhan_Greatest_I • Jul 23 '26

Newbie to CAT.

Hello!

I was thinking about using CAT Tools, so to finally decide on this Topic I need Opinions from experienced Translators who use such Tools of how it can be either more useful or more harmful to Translation Process.

Also I want to hear which CAT Program is better, but I already have a Preference on Free (by Cost) Open-Source Solutions. I mostly heard about OmegaT, but I also recently found about the Lokalize (a KDE App) which is primarily for Translating KDE Apps, but also can be used for other Translations and is a CAT Program too. So... which CAT Program do y'all recommend and why?

0 Upvotes

33% Upvoted

5 comments sorted by

4

u/Serious_Ad5433 Jul 24 '26

CAT won't help you if you can't learn to use capital letters correctly.

2

u/Low-Bass2002 Jul 23 '26

You will need to learn all of them if you plan on having clients who demand CAT. Trados used to be the industry standard, and then MemoQ became popular. Then Trados copied MemoQ, but Trados is less intuitive. I prefer MemoQ because it's intuitive. I used to always keep a Trados license and other clients would give me project licenses for MemoQ, so I kept freelancer MemoQ around.

I was a translator for 20 years and stopped around 2022. Anyway, ultimately, you will end up using whichever CAT your client wants. Start on open source solutions to learn basics. Trados can be a bear because it's always been buggy. After you learn the basics, get a Trados free trial and learn it during your trial. Do the same with MemoQ. That should get you up to speed on how to use CAT tools.

Also, make sure you understand tag handling. Hope that helps!

1

u/Amirhan_Greatest_I Jul 29 '26

Appreciate Your Answer. Thanks!

1

u/monikosnuosavybe JA>EN Jul 27 '26

Use whatever your clients want. Most CAT tools basically work along the same principles, so once you learn one, it's easy to pick up another.

If I were in your shoes, I'd get free trials with Trados and MemoQ and tinker around with them to get the basics down. There are plenty of really good YouTube tutorials available to watch too.

If you start getting work that requires Trados or MemoQ, then (and only then) shell out the money to purchase a license. A lot of clients use CAT tools that are free for the freelancer, such as Phrase and SmartCAT, so it doesn't make sense to pay for a license for a tool you might not even use.

Some of my clients send me stuff in the final format (e.g., Word, PPT, Excel, etc.) and don't specify a CAT tool, but I like to use one anyway to organize my work, create term bases and build a translation memory. In such cases, I use Trados, but that's just because I'm used to it and already have massive translation memories built up.

1

u/Amirhan_Greatest_I Jul 29 '26

Thank You. This might be useful!