← Live Screen & Voice Translate
Translate with a double back tap
Set this up once and tapping the back of your iPhone twice will take a screenshot and translate it, in one gesture. It takes a minute or two.
1Add the shortcut
Tapping the button below opens the Shortcuts app. Look over what it does and choose Add Shortcut.
It has just two steps: Take Screenshot, then Translate Screenshot from this app.
The shortcut was shared with its Japanese name, so it may appear in your list as スクショを翻訳. That is the right one — you can rename it in the Shortcuts app if you prefer.
2Assign it to Back Tap
iOS does not let an app do this part for you, so please set it by hand.
- Open Settings
- Tap Accessibility
- Tap Touch
- Scroll to the very bottom and tap Back Tap
- Tap Double Tap
- Scroll a long way down to the Shortcuts section and choose the shortcut you added in step 1
3Try it
Open whatever you want to read and tap the back of your iPhone twice. A screenshot is taken, the app opens and the translation starts on its own.
The other features have shortcuts too
Camera translation, conversation translation and live translation are available in the Shortcuts app straight away — no setup needed. Search the Shortcuts app for Camera Translation, Conversation Translation or Open Live Translation, or assign one of them to Back Tap the same way as above.
If it does not work
- Back Tap does not respond: a thick case can make it hard to detect. Also check that you did not assign it to Triple Tap instead.
- The shortcut is not in the list: check that step 1 finished. If All Shortcuts in the Shortcuts app contains it, it was added.
- The app opens but nothing is translated: this happens when the shortcut was built by hand. See below.
Building the shortcut by hand
- Create a new shortcut in the Shortcuts app
- Add the action Take Screenshot
- Add the action Translate Screenshot (from this app)
- Set the Image field — this is the part that catches people out.
Tapping the Image field opens a file picker, which is not what you want. Press and hold the value instead → Select Variable → Screenshot.
You have it right when a blue Screenshot chip appears in the field. Without that connection the shortcut reports success but passes nothing, so no translation happens and nothing is saved to history.