Yes for text — Claude translates a sentence in 1-3 seconds, a paragraph in 3-5 seconds. That's real-time for chat, email, and document workflows. For live audio translation (interpreter-style), Claude itself doesn't transcribe speech; pair it with a transcription tool.
Two meanings of 'real-time translation'
1. Live text translation (Claude excels)
For Slack messages, emails, chat, document selections — Claude is fast enough to feel instant. Lazie streams the Claude output as it generates, so you see the first words within 1 second.
2. Live speech translation (Claude alone doesn't)
Claude is a text model — it doesn't process audio. For live audio (meeting interpretation, video calls), you need:
- Audio → text transcription (Whisper, Apple Voice transcription, Otter)
- Text → translation (Claude, GPT-4, etc.)
This works but isn't truly real-time — typically 5-15 seconds end-to-end. For native real-time speech translation, Google Translate Live or Apple's built-in Translate (Live mode) are designed for that.
Claude latency on Mac
- Claude Haiku — ~1 second for short text
- Claude Sonnet — ~2 seconds typical
- Claude Opus — 3-5 seconds for paragraphs
In Lazie, you see streamed output starting at 0.5-1s — practically real-time for text workflows.
Best 'real-time text' setup on Mac
Install Lazie. Pick Claude Haiku or Sonnet as default for streaming-feel latency. Select any text in any app — translation appears in 1-3 seconds.
Originally published at lazie.ai — the AI translator for Mac.
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