Italian (italiano)

Italian (it, ita) belongs to the Southern European language. Wikidata records about 64.8M speakers. It is written in Italian alphabet. It is an official language in 4 countries, including Italy, San Marino, Switzerland and Vatican City.

Italian distinguishes formal Lei from informal tu, and nouns, adjectives and past participles agree in gender and number. Romance dialogue often shifts from Lei to tu as intimacy grows — a useful tool for translators.

Expect text translated from English into Italian to grow by roughly 10–25%, which matters for layouts, subtitles and page counts.

In the United States, 519,829 people aged 5+ speak Italian at home (Census ACS), and 124,000 of them (24%) speak English less than "very well" — a key indicator of demand for Italian translators and interpreters.

Translation guides

• English → Italian translation
• Italian → English translation

Where Italian is official

• Italy
• San Marino
• Switzerland
• Vatican City

Rates for Italian translation

Italian falls in our major western european band: roughly $0.08–$0.16 per word for general commercial work. These are indicative ranges, not quotes — specialised, certified and rush work costs more, and literary translation is usually priced per 1,000 words.

For context, the median salaried translator or interpreter in the US earned $60,170 in May 2025 (BLS). See salaries by state →

Where Italian is spoken in the US, state by state →