What a literary translation costs per word, what AI translation costs per book, and how to decide which route a title deserves.
The short answer
There’s no single price, because there are three quite different ways to get a book into another language. Each is priced differently, and one publisher can use all three across the same list.
| Route | How it’s priced | 85,000-word novel, one language | Best suited to |
|---|---|---|---|
| Literary translator | Per word, sometimes per page or a flat fee, often with a royalty | $8,500 to $11,050 | Titles where the translator’s voice is part of the book |
| AI translation with human review | Per book, plus the review | $1,140 to $2,140 | Commercial fiction and backlist going into core markets |
| AI translation only | Per book | $140 | Rights samples, scouting and internal reads, not publication |
Translator figures are our arithmetic at $0.10 and $0.13 per word, the survey rates explained below, not quotes. AI figures are Luman’s published one-off price for an 80,000 to 100,000-word book, plus Luman’s typical $1,000 to $2,000 human review.
What a human literary translation costs
The most useful recent public data comes from the Authors Guild. Its Survey of U.S. Literary Translators’ Working Conditions in 2022, run with the American Literary Translators Association and other groups, drew 279 responses.
Asked about their most recent book, prose translators reported rates from $0.01 to more than $0.40 per word. The largest group charged $0.10 or less, followed by $0.12. The average was $0.13 per word, up from $0.12 in the Guild’s 2017 survey.
An 85,000-word novel at the $0.13 average comes to $11,050 for one language. At $0.10 it’s $8,500. Three languages at the average: $33,150, before editing, proofreading or typesetting any of the translated editions.
Two caveats matter before you put those numbers in a budget.
- Source words or target words? The survey doesn’t separate the two, and the same text can run noticeably longer or shorter in another language. Agree up front which count the fee is based on.
- There’s no official rate card. The Guild notes that US professional organisations haven’t issued suggested rates, for fear of antitrust exposure. Every fee is negotiated.
Royalties
The fee isn’t always the end of it. About 46% of prose translators in the survey said their contracts always or usually include a royalty clause, 26% said sometimes, and 28% said never. Reported royalty rates ran from 0.5% to 5%, with the vast majority at 1%. Half said royalties are paid only once the fee has earned out as an advance.
In the UK, literary translators are represented by the Translators Association, part of the Society of Authors. We haven’t quoted a UK rate here because we couldn’t find a current published figure to cite.
Time is part of the cost
The same survey makes a point about pace that gets less attention than rates: “Most translators agree that 1,000 words a day of polished literary text is the maximum a person can reasonably achieve.”
At that pace, an 85,000-word novel takes one translator at least 85 working days, roughly 17 weeks, before the translated edition goes to its own copyedit and proof. For a single prestige title that’s simply the schedule. For a publisher planning a backlist programme across four or five languages, the calendar can become a harder limit than the budget, especially if a rights licence sets a date by which the translation must be published.
The costs beyond the translation
Whichever route you choose, the translated edition still has to be published. These lines sit on top of the translation itself:
- The licence. If you don’t already hold translation rights, there’s an advance to the rights holder.
- Editing the translation. A copyedit by an editor who works in the target language.
- Proofreading once the translated edition is laid out, plus typesetting and adapting the cover.
- Metadata and marketing copy, including translated back-cover copy.
- Translator royalties, if the contract includes them.
Because these costs are broadly the same whichever route you take, it’s cleanest to compare routes on the translation line alone, then add the rest.
What AI translation costs
Luman prices one-off translations per book, per language, by word count:
| Book length | Price per language |
|---|---|
| 40,000 to 60,000 words | $100 |
| 60,000 to 80,000 words | $120 |
| 80,000 to 100,000 words | $140 |
| 100,000 to 120,000 words | $160 |
| 120,000 to 140,000 words | $180 |
| 140,000+ words | Custom |
Luman’s published one-off prices, September 2026. Prices are also shown in GBP and EUR on the pricing page.
For regular volume, monthly subscriptions cover up to 1 million or 3 million words a month, with enterprise plans beyond that. So the same 85,000-word novel going into French, German and Spanish costs $420 in translation before review.
What comes back is a formatted manuscript, not a text dump. Chapter headings, italics and paragraph breaks are kept, from .docx, .epub or .pdf files. Luman’s core publishing languages work in either direction: British and US English, French, German, Castilian Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, Italian, Dutch and Swedish. It also translates fiction and narrative non-fiction from 77 source languages into British or American English, and the word-count prices above apply to all 77 of them: there’s no premium tier by language.
Budget for review, not just translation
The per-book price is only half the comparison. Review is the other half, and it’s the larger half.
A thorough human review by a linguistic specialist typically costs $1,000 to $2,000 per title, depending on the language pair, the genre and the length of the book. That’s what turns a machine translation into a manuscript you can publish.
Take the same 85,000-word novel into one language. A literary translator at the survey average comes to $11,050. AI translation plus a thorough human review comes to $1,140 to $2,140: roughly a tenth to a fifth of the cost, for a publish-ready manuscript rather than a raw draft.
Our arithmetic, from the figures above. It’s the translation line only, and both routes still carry the editing, proofreading and typesetting costs of a translated edition.
The honest comparison is the translator’s fee against the machine translation plus the review that particular title needs, never the $140 on its own. Our view is simple: if a title matters enough to publish, it matters enough to review.
Which route fits which title
When the prose is the product
Literary fiction, prize submissions, authors whose voice is what sells: commission a literary translator. They’re a creative partner in the book, and we wouldn’t suggest otherwise. Even on these titles it pays to clean the source first. Any inconsistency left in the original, whether a character’s name spelled two ways or a timeline slip, is something the translator has to query or carry over.
Commercial fiction and backlist
When the goal is to get well-performing genre titles into core markets, and the number of languages matters as much as the individual sentence, a machine translation reviewed by native speakers changes what’s affordable. Scale the review to the title’s visibility: a sample check for a deep-backlist title, a full proofreading pass for a lead title.
Translations no reader will see
Some translations are working documents, and AI translation on its own is enough for them: sample chapters for a rights meeting, a foreign-language submission your acquisitions team can’t read, a title you want to assess before bidding. Speed matters more than polish here, and nobody outside the building reads the result.
Translation grants
If you’re a UK publisher bringing a book into English, check PEN Translates before you set the budget. English PEN’s programme covers up to 75% of translation costs, or up to 100% for publishers with annual turnover under £500,000. English PEN says that over the last four years the average award was £2,750, and 80% of grants fell between £1,000 and £4,750.
There are two rounds a year. Applications made in April to May are decided in December, and those made in October to November are decided the following June. A grant-funded title needs planning well ahead of its publication date.
Some cultural institutes in source countries also fund translations of their own literature. Rules on who can apply, and on how the translation is produced, vary from fund to fund, so read them before you build a budget around a grant.
A five-question budget check
- What’s the translation for: publication, a rights pitch, or an internal read?
- If a translator is quoting, is the fee based on source or target words?
- How many languages, and do they need to launch together?
- What level of review does this title need before it reaches readers?
- Deadlines. A licence may set a publication date, and grant rounds only open twice a year.
Questions publishers ask
How much does it cost to translate a 300-page book?
Page counts vary too much with trim size and typesetting to price reliably, so convert to a word count first. At the 2022 US average of $0.13 per word, every 10,000 words costs about $1,300 for a human translation. With Luman, the price is set by the book’s word-count tier, from $100 per language.
Do literary translators get royalties?
Often, but not always. In the Authors Guild’s 2022 survey, about 46% of prose translators said their contracts always or usually include a royalty clause. Most of those royalties were 1%, and half were paid only after the translation fee had earned out.
How much does human review of an AI translation cost?
A thorough review by a linguistic specialist typically runs $1,000 to $2,000 a title, set by the language pair, the genre and the book’s length. On an 85,000-word novel that puts the whole route at $1,140 to $2,140 against about $11,050 for a literary translator at the 2022 US survey average.
Is AI translation good enough to publish?
That depends on the title and on the review you put behind it. Luman treats its output as a manuscript for your team to review, not a finished book, and publishers decide how much human review to add before publication. Luman flags; editors decide.
How long does a human literary translation take?
Most translators surveyed by the Authors Guild agree that 1,000 polished words a day is the realistic maximum. That puts an 85,000-word novel at 85 working days or more for one translator, before editing and proofreading the translated edition.
Can we get funding to translate a book into English?
UK-based publishers can apply to PEN Translates, which covers up to 75% of translation costs, or up to 100% for publishers turning over less than £500,000 a year. Rounds open twice a year.
Sources
- Authors Guild, Survey of U.S. Literary Translators’ Working Conditions in 2022 (PDF), and announcement, 16 November 2023.
- English PEN, PEN Translates, accessed September 2026.
- Luman Technology, Pricing and Luman Translation, accessed September 2026.
