It may be one of the most universally loved cuisines, but when it comes to figuring out what you’re actually eating, Chinese food can be quite the struggle. Luckily, technology has a solution. Meet Waygo, an augmented reality visual translation app that has just launched a food photo feature which promises to “provide greater context and clarity to its Chinese menu translations.”
Already, Waygo translates Chinese, Japanese, and Korean languages to English by scanning characters and finding relevant text, but now, you’ll have even more insights when you’re trying to decipher the sometimes tricky menus at your favorite dining establishments.
Featuring the “top 4,000 Chinese dishes” and over 14,000 curated images, Waygo claims that its users will be privy to “an in-depth knowledge of foreign cuisine.” With the new app feature, you’ll be able to check out how dishes are prepared and other details about the menu.
“Translating a menu might tell you generally what the dish is, but doesn’t give users the full story. Our food photo feature makes it easier to be more adventurous when ordering off foreign menus with confidence and understanding,” said Kevin Clark, co-founder and product director of Waygo. “This feature is the result of years of effort, which originally started out as a drive to improve the quality of food-related translations in Waygo.”
The newest food feature makes use of Optical Character Recognition (OCR) and offline image processing, which allows diners to provide an English translation of Chinese menu items, alongside a photo of the dish. “Waygo has evolved as a premier menu translation app that encourages travelers to live and dine like the locals, without the worry of ordering the wrong menu item,” said Ryan Rogowski CEO and co-founder of Waygo. “After spending one year in China as an iOS developer, I became inspired to create Waygo because I was stuck ordering the same dish, Kung Pao chicken, because I wasn’t knowledgeable about the local food and couldn’t understand Chinese.”
