Scene Context
The protagonist returns to the forest. Ai (a girl) ran out to greet him. Nina is explaining why Ai left the safety of the forest.
LighTL
Context-aware translation optimized for long-form Japanese novels. Consistent characters, terminology, and narrative understanding across every chapter.
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To be the best machine translation tool money can buy for Japanese novels
Powered by cutting-edge AI with unlimited computational resources. We don't cut corners—you get the full power of what's technically possible, and we send you the bill.
We translate, not edit. The author's intent is preserved without judgment or modification—no over-localization, no sanitizing content because we're translating fiction, not rewriting it.
Full control over translation style and approach. Create multiple threads, fork from any chapter, experiment with different strategies. Every decision is yours.
Three approaches to translating novels—understand the trade-offs
Google Translate, DeepL, etc.
General-purpose translation. Fast and cheap, but not designed for long-form fiction.
LLM-powered with glossaries
Better than basic MT, but glossaries are just dictionaries—the AI doesn't understand context or narrative.
Context-aware AI translation
The AI actually reads your novel sequentially. Highest quality, highest cost—you pay for real comprehension.
The trade-off: Free MT works for getting the gist. Glossary-based AI improves consistency. LighTL trades cost for comprehension—the AI actually understands what it's reading, not just pattern-matching words.
Context-aware translation with full transparency
The protagonist returns to the forest. Ai (a girl) ran out to greet him. Nina is explaining why Ai left the safety of the forest.
Everything you need for high-quality novel translation
Configure how LighTL translates your novels. Control honorific handling—keep them, translate them, or use custom rules. Adjust translation style from literal to natural. Add custom instructions for terminology and LighTL adapts to your preferences.
LighTL maintains consistency across your entire novel. Characters, places, and concepts are translated uniformly from start to finish.
LighTL automatically self-corrects during translation when it realizes mistakes or gains new insights—and you see every revision it makes. Request your own revisions for specific lines with custom instructions. LighTL revises the line and adjusts related content to maintain coherence with the rest of your novel. Full version history tracks all changes.
Create multiple translation threads with different settings. Branch from any chapter to try alternative approaches. Keep all versions and compare the results.
Reading a web novel series? Import chapters directly with one click. The system automatically finds the next chapter for you. No copy-pasting, no hassle.
Automatically identifies and tracks speakers in dialogue-heavy scenes, maintaining consistent voice and characterization throughout conversations.
Four simple steps to translate your novel
Set up your novel with a title and configure translation preferences. Choose how to handle honorifics, adjust translation style from literal to natural, and add custom instructions for terminology. These settings apply to all translations of this novel.
Import chapters from supported web novel sites or paste them manually. You can start from any chapter—just provide the reading order. Starting from Chapter 1 gives best results as LighTL builds understanding sequentially, but you have full control.
Start a translation thread that processes chapters in order. LighTL maintains context as it reads—understanding characters, terminology, and plot developments from earlier chapters. Translation memory flows forward within each thread.
Review translations with full transparency—see original text, speaker identification, and context for every line. Request revisions for specific lines or entire chapters with custom instructions. LighTL remembers your preferences for future chapters. Fork any chapter to create alternate translation paths. Export when ready.
Pay only for what you use. We don't subsidize your reading habit with a cheap subscription—you pay for the actual compute.
Start translating immediately—no credit card required
Start translating with your free credit today
Quick answers to help you get started
Think of it like a human translator reading your novel from start to finish. LighTL maintains context across thousands of chapters, remembering character relationships, terminology decisions, and narrative threads throughout your entire work.
This is why starting from Chapter 1 gives the best results—LighTL builds understanding as it reads, just like you would.
You're paying for compute, not a fixed per-chapter rate. The cost varies based on:
As a rough estimate, typical light novel chapters (around 150 lines) cost approximately $0.50, but this can vary—some chapters cost less, some cost more. You'll see the exact credit usage after each translation completes.
Revisions you request also consume credits—each revision requires LighTL to reprocess context and adjust related content for consistency.
Currently, we support Japanese → English translation only.
We have plans to support additional language pairs (Chinese, Korean) in future updates based on demand.
Yes. You have multiple export options:
You own your translations. Do whatever you want with them.
It depends on the type of mistake:
One-off translation error: If you just don't like how a specific line was translated, you can fork that chapter, revise it, and continue on the same thread. The revision stays isolated.
Translation decision you disagree with: This is trickier. If LighTL made a terminology or style decision you don't like (e.g., how they translated a character name or honorific), you'll want to fork from that chapter and retranslate forward from there. Why? Because LighTL maintains consistency—it will keep using that decision in future chapters whether you like it or not.
Best practice: Review translations chapter by chapter as they complete. Fix issues early before they propagate through your entire novel.
It depends on backend load:
Don't worry—translations run in the background. Queue up multiple chapters and leave them overnight if needed.
Have more questions?
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Send us your questions, feedback, or bug reports
support@lightl.netWe typically respond within 24-48 hours