Use AI Inbox Translation to read and respond to customer conversations in your preferred language — without switching tools. Customer messages are translated into your language preference (set in Settings > Personal > Multilingual), and your replies are translated back into the customer's language. This article covers how to enable and configure translation, how on-demand translation works, and how to troubleshoot common issues.
AI Inbox Translation translates messages instantly, so your teammates can analyze conversations in any language—without switching tools or relying on third-party software. Every conversation stays in one inbox, fully translated and easy to follow.
Note: Each teammate gets 10 free translated conversations per month. Unlimited use of AI Inbox Translation requires the Copilot add-on — teammates without a Copilot seat will have translations paused after reaching the monthly limit. Workspace-level settings can only be configured by workspace admins.
How to turn on AI Inbox Translation
Toggle on Enable AI Inbox Translation.
In the Languages section, configure your workspace languages.
Default language: Choose the primary language for your workspace. This will be the default translation language for any teammate who hasn't set a personal language preference.
Additional languages: Select up to 10 additional languages. Teammates will be able to select these as their personal language setting. Translations to Additional languages may be slightly slower than translations to the Default language.
Next, configure Supported Languages. These are the languages that Fin and Messenger can automatically detect and translate conversations from. You can click Select all or choose specific languages from the list. When All languages are selected, it enables all supported languages listed here.
Set your Translation tone preferences. Choose a tone that matches your brand's voice, this will be used for translating your team's message to the customer.
Click Save at the top of the page.
Using AI Inbox Translation
How does on-demand translation work in the Inbox?
Additional language translations are generated on demand, not automatically for every configured language. When a teammate opens a conversation, the Inbox translates it into their language setting. Other teammates can then see available translations via the Language menu in the conversation header.
The translation toggle below each message shows two options: the original message language and your language setting — it does not show all configured workspace languages. The Language menu in the conversation header lists every translation that has been generated for that conversation so far.
Note: A translation is only generated when a teammate with that language set as their language preference opens the conversation. If a translation appears to be missing, it may not have been generated yet — check the Language menu in the conversation header to see which translations are available.
Once AI Inbox Translation is active, incoming messages in any of your supported languages will be translated into your personal Your language setting when you open a conversation in the Inbox.
Open any conversation where a customer is speaking a different language. You’ll notice below each message it indicates which language a message was sent in, but the messages will appear in your default language.
Example: A customer sends a message in Spanish and Fin replies in Spanish. When you view this conversation, the messages are automatically translated into your default language.
Translated messages show the original language below the message text. Click this label to toggle between the translated and original versions of that message.
If you prefer not to translate a specific conversation, select the three-dot menu at the top of the conversation, then click Translate conversation to disable or enable it for this conversation. This setting applies only to the selected conversation as shown to you. It does not impact how other teammates see the selected conversation.
What happens when AI Inbox Translation is enabled?
Incoming messages in any of your supported languages will be translated into your personal language setting when you open a conversation in the Inbox.
If the customer’s language is not supported, translation will not be available.
If you turn off AI translations, all translations will stop. New inbound conversations will no longer be automatically translated.
If you haven't set a language preference, messages will be translated into the workspace's default language.
How do I set my personal translation preferences?
Each teammate can customize their own AI Inbox Translation experience independently. To find your personal settings, go to Settings > Personal > Multilingual.
Here you can configure:
Enable AI Inbox Translation: You can turn translations on or off just for your own account by using this toggle. This will not affect other teammates.
Your language: Choose the language you want conversations translated into. This defaults to your workspace's default language. You can only choose from the workspace Default or Additional languages.
Tip: To trigger a translation in a language that isn't your default, temporarily change your language setting in Settings > Personal > Multilingual to the required language, open the conversation, then switch back.
Translation content filtering
When viewing translated conversations, you might see a "Translation skipped" notice on some messages. This happens when messages contain content that doesn't need to be translated or would result in a poor translation.
Why is an AI Inbox Translation skipped?
Emoji-only content: Messages that consist primarily of emojis won't be translated, as emojis are universal.
Repetitive messages: Messages with large amounts of repeated text, like spam, won't be translated because they don't provide meaningful text.
Special character noise: Messages that are full of special characters and symbols without meaningful text will be skipped.
Which languages does AI Inbox Translation support?
AI Inbox Translation is available only for languages listed in your workspace supported languages.
Including:
Arabic, Bengali, Bosnian, Brazilian Portuguese, Bulgarian, Catalan, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, German (Formal), Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, Malay, Mongolian, Norwegian, Persian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Simplified Chinese, Slovenian, Spanish, Swahili, Swedish, Thai, Traditional Chinese, Turkish, Ukrainian, and Vietnamese.
Limitations
AI Inbox Translation does not apply to the following:
The Intercom Conversations App — translations are not available here
Ticket properties and content — the conversation thread linked to a ticket is still translated, but the ticket object itself is not. To translate a ticket message, use AI Compose > Translate manually.
Simple automation (bot) messages — these appear in the language they were sent, not your language setting
FAQs
Why did AI Inbox Translation turn off unexpectedly?
Why did AI Inbox Translation turn off unexpectedly?
The most common cause is stale browser tabs overwriting newer changes.
Prevention tips:
Use only one browser tab when editing settings.
Reload the settings page before saving.
Close any duplicate settings tabs or windows.
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