We’ve got some good news and some better news. The good news (okay, great news actually) is that Covid restrictions finally seem to be easing all over the world, and that we’re slowly, but surely, returning to normal.
The better news is that many translation and localization conferences aren’t necessarily in a rush to move back offline. And, while we love to see all of you face to face, we’ve truly been spoiled with many great online events from all over the world (and without attendance limits!) during the last two years.
The online format hasn’t just made many events more accessible. It has also created true communities where translators, localization managers, languages services, and others can come together and share experiences and best practices, and take their businesses to the next level.
Well, whether you as a language professional prefer offline or online translation and localization conferences, we’ve got your back. We’ve gone ahead and done the hard work, so you won’t have to. Below are some of the most popular upcoming events as well as some of our personal favorites.
Why attend a localization conference?
Experts giving away great advice
It’s never been easier for true localization experts to attend or teach at these types of events online. That means access to some of the industry’s brightest minds is readily available and just a few clicks away. It’s your chance to get a little wiser.
Nerd out completely with like-minded individuals
Are you used to people sighing when you start talking about the intriguing differences between German in Switzerland and Austria? How did your local product testing give completely different results in Chile and Argentina? Not here. Here they love it. Translation and localization conferences are the perfect places to find your fellow enthusiasts and bond over difficulties with HTML and pluralization.
Network with your peers
Getting to live out your personal passion is, of course, one aspect – but it’s equally beneficial for professional networking. Whether you need a new translation agency, linguistic sparring partner, or new technology, you’ll be able to meet a bunch of interesting people right here. And that’s both online and offline!
Learn about new resources
When surrounded by other localization aficionados, it’s a great opportunity to learn about the resources they use in their day-to-day work. Do they have a specific CAT tool that helps them get the job done faster? Do they have a specific company helping them out in LATAM or Arabic markets? Do they use a platform that easily helps localization managers communicate with developers? Keep an eye out for these hidden golden nuggets.
Get inspired for future jobs
Although we’re all in the same business, there are so many different fields and job roles that you might never have thought about – and a translation and localization conference is a great place to get inspired. At an event like this, you’ll be exposed to different types of industries and how they tackle globalization processes within individual companies. You might hear about interesting companies or people who inspire you to follow a new career path.
Keep your wallet in your pocket
Okay okay, we admit it – not all the events are completely free. Not even if they’re online. But online events have without a doubt lowered prices significantly, as they don’t require physical rented spaces and are able to sell more tickets than normal. You also save money on traveling, accommodation, and eating out. What’s not to like?
Attend from near and far
Another obvious benefit of having a translation and localization conference online is that people can attend no matter where they are in the world. It’s a win-win for everyone. More people are able to share their valuable input, and the conference organizers can have more varied experts and unlimited spots for attendees, if desired.
Top events coming up in 2022
We’re already well into 2022, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t still loads of exciting events to attend this year. Below we give you a short breakdown of some of our favorites that you should probably have a look at, too.
1. Institute of Translation and Interpreting Conference
The ITI Conference might only be two days long, but it has a packed program with four tracks – one focusing solely on interpreting. You’ll find a great deal of variety here from experts across the industry.
● Date: May 31 to June 1, 2022
● Location: Brighton, UK, and online – hybrid event
● Primary audience: Translators, interpreters, language service providers
2. BP22 Translation Conference
If you’re a professional translator looking for an event, this might just be it. You’ll have plenty of different speakers, representing different subjects, while there is still a heavy focus on getting to know each other.
● Date: May 9 to May 11, 2022
● Location: Lisbon, Portugal, and online – hybrid event
● Primary audience: Professional translators
3. EAMT 2022
This in-person event is the European Association for Machine Translation’s 23rd Annual Conference. Once almost unthinkable, machine translation (MT) is becoming more and more democratized – and the quality is getting increasingly better. This is for you if you want to know what the future might hold for this technology.
● Date: June 1 to June 3, 2022
● Location: Ghent, Belgium – in-person
● Primary audience: Mostly language companies and translators
4. GlobalSaké 2022
This year alone, GlobalSaké has arranged four events (one in each quarter) with different themes, such as the human factor, process, technology, and geo-fit.
● Date: June 2 / September 1 / December 1, 2022
● Location: San Francisco, USA – in-person/online
● Primary audience: Translation professionals, companies, project managers, and more
5. United We Grow | LEO’s 5th International Virtual Conference
This conference’s focus is on staying more united and supportive of each other – both privately and professionally. That’s why you’ll find topics such as “Interpreting in times of war”, but also broader topics such as neural machine translation.
● Date: June 23 to June 24, 2022
● Location: Online
● Primary audience: Translators, interpreters
6. LocWorld47 Berlin
This year’s theme will be ‘unlimited’, and the conference will take a closer look at how you can reach people all over the world. What have industry peers done so far and how can they learn from their mistakes? They’ll give their best shot at answering here.
● Date: July 11 to July 13, 2022
● Location: Berlin, Germany – in-person
● Primary audience: All types of localization professionals, product managers, translations, linguists, and others
7. AMTA 2022 Orlando
This hybrid event will provide plenty of chances for industry networking, while remote access lets people from all over the world join. This event is also looking at MT and its technologies to explore how it can play a role in speech-to-speech translation, automatic video dubbing, machine translation of sign language, and much more.
● Date: September 12 to September 16, 2022
● Location: Orlando, Florida, USA – hybrid event
● Primary audience: Professionals within machine translation, such as researchers, academics, and technology providers
8. KTLC 2022
This translation and localization conference promotes itself as being for the whole industry to talk, learn, and communicate. It usually has a wide range of topics, and is one of the biggest in Europe.
● Date: September 29 to October 1, 2022
● Location: Warsaw, Poland – in-person
● Primary audience: Freelancers, companies, translations agencies, and academics
9. ATA63 Annual Conference
The American Translators Association has people from more than 50 countries attending over its 4-day event. Check out their website to get a glimpse of what previous years’ conferences offered. An event that focuses on both networking and learning.
● Date: October 12 to October 14, 2022
● Location: Los Angeles, USA – in-person
● Primary audience: Translators and professional language companies
10. Meet Central Europe 2022 Conference
This event is a conference and a job fair in one, giving attendees unique opportunities. The website states that the goal is to maximize ROI for both time and cost, while at the same time providing you with the necessary knowledge, skills, and contacts.
● Date: October 12 to October 14, 2022
● Location: Bratislava, Slovakia – in-person
● Primary audience: Freelancers, localization industry professionals, project managers, and others
11. Focus on Project Management
Elia’s conference looks to develop the actual skills of project and production managers. They will introduce you to new approaches and ways of thinking to help you become even more unstoppable in your role.
● Date: December 1 to December 2, 2022
● Location: Manchester, United Kingdom – in-person
● Primary audience: Project managers
12. NeTTT (New Trends in Translation & Technology)
The first event of its kind, this will be a 2-day course in neural machine translation, as well as sharing experience within the field and identifying new trends. With both workshops and networking events, this conference offers a unique learning experience.
● Date: July 4 to July 6, 2022
● Location: Rhodes Island, Greece – in-person
● Primary audience: Academics, translation students, machine learning/natural language processing professionals
13. ALC 20th Annual Summit | Las Vegas
This 3-day conference by the Association of Language Companies is a great place to strengthen your business position and understanding of localization with training, discussions, and panels, and growing your community of peers.
● Date: September 13 to September 15, 2022
● Location: Las Vegas, Nevada, USA – in-person
● Primary audience: Language industry leaders, project managers, language companies
GrowthPulse ’22
Of course, we can’t talk about translation and localization conferences without mentioning our very own – GrowthPulse. This is a day-long online event where we’ll bring together tech’s movers, shakers, and growth makers. GrowthPulse lets leaders of start-ups and scale-ups show you how to assemble all the pieces of your expansion jigsaw and equip your business for global-ready growth across five tracks:
- Customer experience
- Productivity
- Localization
- Hiring and managing talent
- Funding
Our very own CEO and co-founder, Nick Ustinov, will be there to give you a warm welcome and introduce talks from Pedro Muller at Intercom, Frederic Linfjärd at Planday, Tony Jamous at Oyster, and many others.
Don’t forget to sign up now if you want to join the event. This way you won’t miss any important updates!
Want to learn even more about localization?
Yup, we know. We’re impatient, too. With GrowthPulse and so many other amazing translation and localization conferences coming up, waiting just got a lot harder. So, if you’re too excited and want to get started on your learning journey, we have on-demand courses at Lokalise Academy. And it’s all free.
