Dictionaries

There are a variety of dictionary options to use for assistance when translating Chinese. My favorite one is MDBG.

As you can see, you just have to past the word or phrase into the bar at the top and the results for each character will pop up. It is useful for many idioms and for deciding on names when you don’t know how to read Chinese.

Pleco

Another widely known program is Pleco. I don’t use it that often but I’ve heard rave things about it from other translators. It is an app so the easiest method to use it is on your phone. That’s why I don’t use it often. If you download a phone simulator to your desktop then you can use Pleco on it but I find that is too much trouble for me.

Chrome Extension

There are also a number of Chrome extensions where you can hover your mouse over a Chinese word and the dictionary meaning will pop up. The one I know off the top of my head is the Zhongwen: Chinese-English Dictionary extension but there should be a few more if you just google ‘Chinese pop-up dictionary chrome extension.’