First of all, I really appreciate the work you are doing on Panels.
I recently started using the Live Text / Live Translation features, and I think this has the potential to be one of the features that really distinguishes Panels from other comic reader apps.
For someone who reads comics in a language other than their native language, being able to detect the text on a comic page, translate it, and display the translation directly inside the speech bubbles is incredibly useful. It makes reading foreign-language comics much more convenient without having to leave the reader, take screenshots, or manually copy text into another translation app.
In fact, Live Translation is one of the main reasons I would consider choosing and paying for Panels over other comic reader apps.
Because of that, I would strongly encourage the Panels team to continue investing in this feature in future versions.
Third-party translation providers / API support
One improvement that I think could make Live Translation significantly more powerful would be support for third-party translation services or translation APIs .
For example, allowing users to choose between Apple’s built-in translation and other providers such as DeepL, Google Translate, or potentially other services would give users much more flexibility.
I am not necessarily suggesting that Panels should commit to any specific translation provider. Instead, an abstraction that allows different translation engines or APIs to be supported would be extremely valuable.
Different translation engines have different strengths, and comic dialogue can be particularly difficult to translate because it often contains:
- slang and informal speech
- sarcasm and jokes
- incomplete sentences
- character-specific speech patterns
- fictional terminology and names
- context that spans multiple speech bubbles
For this reason, having the ability to choose a different translation engine could make a very noticeable difference in translation quality.
Remembering translation preferences
Another very useful improvement would be allowing Panels to remember the user’s translation preferences.
For example:
English → Traditional Chinese
Once configured, Panels could automatically use those languages whenever Live Translation is activated, instead of requiring the user to repeatedly configure the translation language.
For users who primarily read comics in one foreign language, this would make the feature feel much more like a proper reading tool rather than an experimental utility.
Long-term potential
I think Live Translation could eventually become one of Panels’ strongest differentiating features.
Many comic readers can already display CBZ, CBR, PDF, and EPUB files. Library management, synchronization, and reading interfaces are also areas where multiple apps compete.
But being able to open a foreign-language comic and have Panels intelligently recognize the dialogue, translate it, and place the translated text back into the original speech bubbles is a very different kind of experience.
If Panels could eventually combine:
- high-quality OCR
- automatic language detection
- selectable translation engines
- third-party translation APIs
- remembered source/target languages
- better handling of comic-specific dialogue and terminology
- consistent translations across a series
then I think Live Translation could become a major reason for people to choose Panels specifically , rather than simply being another feature in a comic reader.
I understand that Panels is developed by a relatively small team and that there are many competing priorities. I also understand that Live Translation is currently experimental.
Nevertheless, I would strongly encourage you to consider continuing to invest in Live Translation in future official releases .
For me personally, this is not just a nice-to-have feature. It is one of the features that makes Panels significantly more attractive than other comic readers, and improving it could directly influence my decision to use and purchase Panels.
Thank you for continuing to develop such a great comic reading experience. I hope Live Translation can eventually become a more mature and powerful part of Panels.