What is language formality?
Many languages supported in automatic translation use different levels of formality depending on the audience and context.
👉 For example:
German uses Sie (formal) and du (informal)
French uses vous (formal) and tu (informal)
By default, Easygenerator uses the Automatic setting, allowing the translation system to determine the most suitable tone based on your content. However, you can also choose a more formal or less formal style to create more consistent, audience-appropriate translations that better match your organization’s communication style and require less manual editing after translation.
Available formality options
When automatically translating a course, you can choose between:
Automatic (default) – the translation system decides the tone and the best fit based on your content
More formal – uses a more professional or formal tone
Less formal – uses a more casual or conversational tone
How to set language formality during translation
How to set language formality during translation
You can configure language formality while automatically translating a course. To do so:
Open your course and navigate to Settings -> Translations.
Click on the Add language -> Auto translate button (for Multi-language versions), or the Translate course (for Independent courses) and select one or more target languages.
Choose a value from the Language formality dropdown in the translation settings section and click on the Translate course button.
💡Note: The Language formality dropdown becomes available when at least one selected language supports formality controls.
Supported languages
Supported languages
Language formality is available for the following languages:
Dutch
French
German
Italian
Japanese
Polish
Portuguese
Portuguese (Brazil)
Russian
Spanish
Vietnamese
Note: For unsupported languages, the translation engine uses its default behavior and tone.
Retranslating a course
Retranslating a course
Language formality settings are retained when:
Retranslating an entire language version
Retranslating individual blocks
👉 You can also change the formality level before retranslating the full course if needed.
FAQs
Does language formality work for all languages?
Does language formality work for all languages?
No. Language formality is only available for the languages supported by the translation tool. Unsupported languages will use the engine’s default translation behavior.
What happens if I choose “Automatic”?
What happens if I choose “Automatic”?
When Automatic is selected, no formality preference is sent to the translation engine. The engine automatically decides the tone of the translation that best suits your content.
Can I change the formality later?
Can I change the formality later?
Yes. You can change the formality setting when retranslating the full course.
Does formality apply to individual blocks?
Does formality apply to individual blocks?
Yes. The selected formality is retained when retranslating individual blocks.
What happens with older translated courses?
What happens with older translated courses?
For existing translated courses created before this feature was introduced, the formality setting defaults to Automatic. If you would like to apply formality, you can retranslate your training.
Why is the Language formality dropdown disabled?
Why is the Language formality dropdown disabled?
The dropdown is disabled when none of the selected languages support formality controls.
Does language formality guarantee perfect consistency?
Does language formality guarantee perfect consistency?
Language formality helps create more consistent translations, but translation quality can still vary depending on the source content and language pair. Additional review may still be needed for highly specialized or branded content.