Share of the global language services market by region 2018

Given its diverse range of languages and high level of economic development, it is perhaps not surprising that Europe is home to the largest language services market in the world, comprising almost half of the global market.

Language services globally

The language services market covers a broad range of activities, from language instruction to professional translation services to localization and voice-over services for media such as film, television and video games. With the world becoming increasingly interconnected through technology, this market has more than doubled since 2009, with an expected global value of almost 50 billion U.S. dollars in 2019. And, there is good reason to expect this market to continue growing – especially given that the market share of the Asia Pacific region is relatively low, yet the region is home to five of the ten most commonly spoken languages in the world.

Machine translation

Technology is playing an increasingly important role in the language services industry. Machine translation, which is the process of using software to translate from one language to another, is a fast-growing field that is expected to more than triple in size from 2017 to 2024. Accordingly, the two largest providers in the global language services market – Transperfect and Lionbridge – are investing heavily in this area, offering software based ‘artificial intelligence’ translation in conjunction with their more traditional translation services.