If you translate text for a living, or even just a few times a day, you know the routine: select the text, copy it, switch to a browser tab, paste it into Google Translate or DeepL, copy the result, switch back, paste it over the original. Four app switches for one sentence.
KeyShift AI does the same translation without any of that. You stay in the email, the document, the chat window, the whole time. Here are the three ways to do it, depending on how you like to work.
1. Select the text and translate it from Quick Actions
If the text already exists, select it and press Ctrl+Shift+A. Quick Actions opens with your selection already loaded — pick Translate, and the text is replaced in place with the translation. No new window opens, no clipboard round-trip.
If you translate often enough to want a dedicated key instead of going through the panel, you can assign one: Settings → Shortcuts → Add, choose Translate as the mode, and pick whatever combination you like.
This works in Word, Outlook, Slack, browser text fields, and most native Windows apps. If you're inside a Chromium app (Chrome, Brave, Edge, Discord, VS Code) on macOS and it doesn't pick up your selection right away, that's a known accessibility quirk we've fixed as of v1.5.6 — update if you're on an older build.
2. Type it, then say what you want, with nothing selected
This is the feature most people don't discover, and it's the one that actually changes how you write. Just type normally — the sentence you'd have translated anyway — then, right after it, type the word keyshift followed by what you want:
i think their going to the store keyshift fix this
Press the space bar twice, and everything before keyshift is replaced with the result of the instruction. Applied to translation, that looks like:
merci pour votre patience keyshift translate to english
Double space, and it becomes "thank you for your patience" — in place, in whatever field you were already typing in. No dropdown, no selecting, no separate window.
This works with any language you can name, not just the ones in a menu: "keyshift translate to formal German," "keyshift translate to Brazilian Portuguese," "keyshift translate this into Turkish and keep it casual." You can also rename the trigger word itself in Settings, if keyshift isn't what you want to type fifty times a day.
3. Live translate: type in your own language, get theirs
If you're writing to someone in a language you don't speak fluently, there's a third mode built for exactly that. Turn on Live Translate for a target language in Settings, then just type normally, in your own language, anywhere. Press the space bar twice, and what you just typed is replaced with the translation — live, as you write, without ever touching a translate shortcut.
This is the mode people use for customer support in a second market, or for messaging a partner, supplier, or friend abroad. You write in the language you think in; they receive the language they read in.
Which one should you use?
- Already have text somewhere and want it translated? Select it, use the shortcut.
- Writing something new and want it translated as you finish? Type the instruction inline.
- Writing an entire conversation in someone else's language? Turn on Live Translate and forget it's on.
All three run on the same engine, so the quality is identical. The only difference is how much of the old copy-paste habit you want to drop first.
One thing worth knowing about cost
If you already pay for an OpenAI, Claude, Gemini, or OpenRouter account, KeyShift can use your own key instead of your monthly credits, at no extra cost per translation. That's worth turning on if translation is most of what you use KeyShift for — see the BYOK guide for the two-minute setup.
Every plan, including Free, includes translation. Try it free with 25 credits a month, or see pricing if you already know you'll want more.