Email translations

Saymail can translate email automatically - both incoming messages you receive and outgoing drafts you compose. Translations are produced by the same LLM that handles classification, so you get them “for free” once an AI connection is configured.

Incoming: translation as part of classification

There’s no separate “Translate this email” button for incoming mail. Translation happens during the classification pass.

When the classifier sees an email written in a language different from your interface language, it can include a translation alongside the regular classification fields. The translation is stored next to the message and rendered as a Translated from {language} block underneath the email body in the viewer.

Each translated email shows:

• A small banner above the translation: Translated from {detected language}.
• The translated body in your interface language.
• A Show original toggle that swaps the translated text for the source text in place.

If the classifier decides the email is already in your interface language, no translation is added.

Which languages

Saymail doesn’t restrict translation to a fixed list - it depends entirely on what your LLM can do. Top-tier hosted models cover dozens of languages confidently; smaller local models tend to be good at the languages they were trained heavily on (typically English, the major European languages, and a handful of others). If translation quality matters, a stronger model gives better results.

Turning translation off

Translation is driven by the classification prompt. If you don’t want translations:

1. Open the LLM Prompts panel.
2. Edit your prompt’s Content to instruct the LLM not to include the translated field.
3. Save.

New classifications stop adding translations. Existing translated messages keep their translations until you reclassify them.

Outgoing: the compose Translate button

The compose window has an always-visible Translate button next to a language picker. There’s no automatic mismatch detection - you decide when to translate, and into which language:

• The language picker defaults to the language of the email you’re replying to (when known), or otherwise to your interface language. Change it to translate into a different language.
• Click Translate to send your current draft to the configured LLM and replace it in place with a translation into the selected language.

This is the only point at which Saymail translates outgoing text - it never auto-translates a draft without your action.

Which connection runs the translation?

Translation uses the same LLM connection as the classification or compose action that triggers it:

• For incoming mail, translation rides on the classification request - same prompt, same connection, no extra LLM call.
• For the compose-side Translate button, Saymail picks the highest-priority healthy connection (or the prompt’s preferred connection if one is pinned).

Translation cost scales with email length. For long messages, a cheaper model may be a good fit. See Choosing your AI setup.