Table of Contents
- Is the new Edge AI translation’s absurd 12GB RAM requirement a disappointing deal-breaker for most users?
- Understanding the AI Audio Translation
- The High Cost of Live Translation
- How the Translation Works in Practice
- Other Important Changes in Microsoft Edge
- New Adobe PDF Engine
- Removal of Outdated Features
- New Security and Enterprise Policies
Is the new Edge AI translation’s absurd 12GB RAM requirement a disappointing deal-breaker for most users?
Microsoft Edge is testing a new feature that uses artificial intelligence to translate the audio from videos in real time. While this is an exciting development, it requires a powerful computer to work, specifically one with at least 12 gigabytes of RAM.
Understanding the AI Audio Translation
The new audio translation tool is available in a test version of Microsoft Edge, specifically the beta build 141.0.3537.13. The purpose of this feature is to let you watch a video in one language and hear the spoken words in another language you understand. It works by using an AI model that listens to the original audio and generates a new audio track with the translated speech.
Because this feature is in an early preview stage, it may not appear for everyone, even if you have the correct beta version of the browser. It shows up in the browser’s settings under a title that reads, “Offer to translate videos on supported sites.” When you enable this setting and visit a supported website with a video, the translation option should appear. This function represents a significant step toward making content more accessible across different languages, but its current form has some important limitations.
The High Cost of Live Translation
Before you can use this feature, it is critical to understand the demands it places on your computer. The live translation is not designed for every machine. It has specific and demanding system requirements that will exclude many older or less powerful computers.
To run the AI audio translation, your computer must have:
- A minimum of 12 gigabytes (GB) of RAM.
- A central processing unit (CPU) with at least four cores.
These requirements are quite high for a web browser feature. To put this into perspective, modern operating systems like Windows 11 can use around 4 GB of RAM just by running in the background. If you have a laptop with 16 GB of RAM, which is common for many new devices, nearly 25% of your memory is already in use before you open any applications. When you activate Edge’s live translation, it consumes a large portion of the remaining free memory.
The feature can use up to 12 GB of RAM by itself. This leaves very little memory available for any other programs you might want to run. If you are translating a video, your computer might become slow or unresponsive if you try to switch to another application. The memory usage is continuous; the feature will hold onto that memory until you manually stop the translation process. This makes multitasking difficult and means the feature is best suited for high-performance desktop computers or premium laptops with more than 16 GB of RAM.
How the Translation Works in Practice
Testing the feature reveals both its potential and its current shortcomings. After you enable the setting, a small, floating control bar appears automatically when you play a video on a supported page. Currently, the list of supported websites is very small. In testing, the feature worked on YouTube but not on other video platforms.
The language options are also very limited at this early stage. For translation, the tool only recognized a few input languages, including Spanish, Korean, and English. To test it, a video in Spanish was played. The browser first needed to download the specific AI model required for the translation. Once the model was installed, the feature started working almost instantly. It muted the video’s original Spanish audio and replaced it with an English translation. There was no significant delay or lag between the original speech and the translated output.
However, accuracy is a major question. Without being fluent in the source language, it is difficult to confirm if the translation is 100 percent correct. The AI model is doing its best to interpret and convert the speech, but nuances can be lost.
A notable problem occurred during the test. The video featured a single male speaker. At times, the AI used two different voices for the translation—one male and one female. This happened when the person in the video changed his pitch or tone. The AI mistakenly interpreted this change as a different person speaking. This can be very confusing for the viewer and shows that the AI still has trouble understanding the subtle complexities of human speech.
Other Important Changes in Microsoft Edge
Alongside the new translation tool, Microsoft is making several other significant updates to the Edge browser. These changes affect how you view PDFs, which older features are being removed, and new options for security and business users.
New Adobe PDF Engine
Microsoft is changing the built-in PDF reader in Edge. For years, Edge has used its own engine to display PDF files. Soon, this will be completely replaced by an engine powered by Adobe, the company that created the PDF format. This change is intended to provide better performance, improved security, and more reliable rendering of documents.
For business and enterprise users, this change will become the default in October 2025. With this new Adobe-powered engine, you will notice an Adobe logo on PDF documents. There will also be a menu button that offers options to edit the PDF, but using these advanced editing features may require a paid Adobe subscription plan. This integration serves as a form of advertising for Adobe’s products within the browser.
Removal of Outdated Features
Microsoft is also cleaning up the browser by removing old and outdated features related to its original EdgeHTML engine. In the upcoming beta version 142, the following components will be removed:
- Legacy Web View: An older method used by some Windows applications to display web content.
- Windows 8/8.1/UWP HTML/JavaScript apps: These are older types of web-based applications that are no longer supported.
- Legacy Progressive Web Apps (PWA): An outdated framework for web apps that has been replaced by newer technology.
- Legacy Microsoft Edge (EdgeHTML) DevTools: The developer tools from the original version of the Edge browser.
New Security and Enterprise Policies
A new security setting is being introduced that will give users more control over their local network. This setting will allow you to prevent websites from requesting access to your local network, which can help protect against potential security risks from malicious sites.
For businesses, system administrators will get two new policies. One policy allows them to control whether tab previews are shown when hovering over a tab. The other policy gives them control over the visibility of the Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat icon in the browser’s sidebar, allowing companies to manage which AI tools are visible to their employees.