Softwr

Translation · head to head

Gengo vs Smartling

Gengo logo

Gengo

Translation

Human translation marketplace and API, priced per word from $0.06, owned by Lionbridge since 2019

From
On request
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Smartling logo

Smartling

Translation

Enterprise translation management sold alongside first-party language services priced per word

From
On request
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Gengo it is not a fit for specialised legal, medical or literary translation, since the crowdsourced model is built for higher-volume, lower-complexity content.; Smartling translation memory is retained for only 180 days on the Core tier, so the asset that would make a future migration cheap expires on the plan most likely to be used by a team testing the water.
  • They diverge on capability: Gengo covers Standard and Pro quality tiers, Smartling covers Translation memory.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Gengo and Smartling actually diverge.

Attributes where Gengo and Smartling differ
AttributeGengoSmartling
Pricing modelPer wordquote
PlatformsWebWeb, API

Identical on both: starting price (On request), free tier (No), user rating (Not yet rated), category (Translation).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Gengo

  • Standard and Pro quality tiers
  • Developer API
  • No minimum spend
  • Crowdsourced translator network
  • Bulk file upload
  • CMS and platform integrations

Only in Smartling

  • Translation memory
  • Visual context CAT editor
  • Configurable workflows
  • First-party language services
  • Linguistic quality assurance
  • Connectors and API

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Gengo

  • An e-commerce seller translating product listings into multiple languages without a minimum spend requirementnot Smartling
  • A company integrating the Gengo API into a content pipeline to automatically route text for human translationnot Smartling
  • A support team needing occasional human-translated responses without committing to Unbabel’s enterprise minimumnot Smartling
  • A publisher needing straightforward, transparently priced human translation for shorter, lower-stakes contentnot Smartling

Smartling

  • A company that wants one supplier answerable for both the translation platform and the quality of the translated outputnot Gengo
  • Marketing sites where a translator needs to see the rendered page, not a spreadsheet of strings, to get tone and length rightnot Gengo
  • Replacing a platform vendor plus several separate agencies with a single contract and a single invoicenot Gengo
  • Content operations at a volume where per-word rates are the dominant cost and the tooling fee is noisenot Gengo

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Gengo

  • It is not a fit for specialised legal, medical or literary translation, since the crowdsourced model is built for higher-volume, lower-complexity content.
  • Quality consistency depends on which individual translator from the crowdsourced network is assigned, which can vary more than a dedicated agency relationship would.
  • Turnaround, while fast for its category, is still meaningfully slower than a machine translation API, since every job requires a human to complete it.
  • Since being acquired by Lionbridge in 2019, Gengo’s product direction is now set within a much larger localisation company’s priorities rather than as an independent business.
  • Per-word pricing, while transparent, is still substantially more expensive per unit of content than a machine translation API, so it is a poor fit for translating very large volumes of low-stakes content.

Smartling

  • Translation memory is retained for only 180 days on the Core tier, so the asset that would make a future migration cheap expires on the plan most likely to be used by a team testing the water.
  • The platform subscription is not published while the per-word service rates are, so you can model the variable cost precisely and cannot model the fixed cost at all until you have been through a sales sizing exercise.
  • The vendor earns on words routed through it, so the commercial relationship rewards volume flowing to Smartling rather than volume being avoided through better reuse of existing memory.
  • Per-word pricing multiplies by target language, so adding a market to a product that ships in twelve languages costs a thirteenth of the current translation bill rather than a marginal amount.
  • Minimum contract term, minimum annual spend and whether individual connectors carry their own charge are all absent from the public site, so three of the numbers that determine total cost only appear inside a proposal.

Pricing, plan by plan

Gengo

On request
  • Standard$0.06/month
    • Human translation, $0.06 per word starting rate
    • No minimum spend or setup fee
  • Pro$undefined/month
    • Higher-quality tier, rate varies by language pair and content type
    • Human translation with additional review

Smartling

On request
  • Core$undefined/year
    • Subscription price not published
    • Basic workflow, user and project management
    • Browser CAT editor with visual context
  • Enterprise$undefined/year
    • Subscription price not published
    • Fully configurable dynamic workflows
    • Translation memory with unlimited storage
  • Language services, charged separately per word$undefined/year
    • Machine translation from 0.0075 USD per word
    • AI translation from 0.06 USD per word
    • AI translation with human review from 0.12 USD per word

Which should you pick?

Choose Gengo if

  • You need standard and pro quality tiers.
  • You also want developer api.
Gengo review

Choose Smartling if

  • You need translation memory.
  • You work on Web, API.
  • You also want visual context cat editor.
Smartling review

Questions people ask

Is Gengo or Smartling better?
Neither clearly leads. Gengo starts at On request and Smartling at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Gengo or Smartling?
Gengo starts at On request and Smartling at On request.
Does Gengo or Smartling run on more platforms?
Gengo runs on Web. Smartling runs on Web, API.
What is Gengo best used for?
Gengo is most often used for an e-commerce seller translating product listings into multiple languages without a minimum spend requirement, a company integrating the gengo api into a content pipeline to automatically route text for human translation, a support team needing occasional human-translated responses without committing to unbabel’s enterprise minimum, a publisher needing straightforward, transparently priced human translation for shorter, lower-stakes content. Of those, an e-commerce seller translating product listings into multiple languages without a minimum spend requirement and a company integrating the gengo api into a content pipeline to automatically route text for human translation are not what Smartling is typically brought in for.
What can Gengo do that Smartling cannot?
Gengo covers Standard and Pro quality tiers, Developer API, No minimum spend, Crowdsourced translator network. Smartling covers Translation memory, Visual context CAT editor, Configurable workflows, First-party language services.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Gengo: Is Gengo machine translation or human translation?

Human translation. It should be compared with Unbabel, not with Google Translate, Microsoft Translator or Amazon Translate, which are machine translation APIs.

Smartling: Is there a free plan?

The Core tier is advertised as free to start, but translation memory is kept for only 180 days on it and any production deployment is a quoted subscription. Treat it as an evaluation route, not a plan.

Gengo: Is there a minimum spend?

No, Gengo publishes per-word pricing with no minimum spend or setup fee, unlike Unbabel’s enterprise-gated rate structure.

Smartling: What does the platform actually cost?

Smartling does not publish it. The published figures are per-word service rates. Expect an annual subscription sized against your content volume, workflows and language count, quoted after a scoping call.

Gengo: Who owns Gengo?

Lionbridge, a larger localisation and AI data services company, acquired Gengo in January 2019.

Smartling: Can I use Smartling with my own translators?

Yes, the platform works with your own vendors and freelancers. You then pay for software and forgo the services revenue the pricing model is built around, which weakens your negotiating position on the subscription.

Smartling: What happens to my translation memory if I leave?

Translation memory is exportable, but on Core it only covers the previous 180 days, so leaving after two years on the entry tier means most of the asset is already gone.

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