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Sakana AI Launches Sakana Translate, a Namazu-Powered Japanese–English–Chinese Translation Tool With Translate, Proofread, and Ask Modes
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Sakana AI has launched Sakana Translate, a free web-based translation tool that handles bidirectional translation across Japanese, English, and Chinese. The tool, integrated into the company's Sakana Chat service, is powered by Namazu, Sakana AI's Japan-adapted model series. This launch marks Sakana AI's entry into the machine translation market, targeting a specific gap in preserving Japanese linguistic nuances.
Sakana AI is a Tokyo-based artificial intelligence lab founded in 2023 by David Ha and Llion Jones. The Namazu model series, first announced on March 24, 2026, applies post-training to existing open-weight foundation models, including DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus, Llama 3.1 405B, and gpt-oss-120B. Post-training adapts pre-trained models with further tuning, a cost-effective approach to fitting models to Japanese language and culture.
Sakana Translate offers three modes: Translate, Proofread, and Ask. The Translate mode provides streaming output with diff highlighting, showing changes inline. Proofread mode goes beyond grammar to tune naturalness, politeness, and register. Ask mode allows users to query nuances directly against the source and output, eliminating the need to switch between translator and dictionary tools.
The translation quality was evaluated using XCOMET-XL on the WMT 2024 General Translation task data. XCOMET-XL, a neural evaluation metric with roughly 3.5 billion parameters from Unbabel, scores translations from 0 to 1. Sakana Translate achieved competitive scores, landing close behind leading models. Qualitative checks showed strengths in honorifics, cultural concepts, place names, and everyday context.
Sakana AI emphasizes that general translation tools often miss distinctive Japanese elements such as business honorifics, culturally specific concepts, abbreviations, and internet slang. Sakana Translate aims to carry context, tone, and register between languages, avoiding the loss of interpersonal tone that can occur with grammar-only approaches. This focus on 'deep translation for Japan' addresses a specific market need.
The company highlights concrete examples, such as a business email translation from Japanese to English that preserves polite, indirect requests. Sakana AI's perspective is that Sakana Translate offers a solution for users requiring culturally aware and tone-sensitive translations, particularly in professional and informal contexts.
Looking ahead, Sakana Translate positions Sakana AI as a player in the specialized translation market, differentiating through Japan-centric adaptation. While the tool currently focuses on three languages, future expansions or improvements may follow. The free web app lowers barriers for users, potentially driving adoption and feedback for further refinement.
