Can you recommend courses or resources to learn about computer-assisted translation?

The most reliable CAT tool resources are the documentation for the specific tool you will use plus a professional credential: Smartling publishes 41 public articles for translators and reviewers, 15 of them on the CAT Tool itself, while the American Translators Association runs a three-hour, open-book, proctored certification exam and a Language Technology Division covering tooling.

Where can you learn to use computer-assisted translation (CAT) tools?

The fastest route to CAT tool competence is the documentation for the specific tool you will actually work in, followed by a professional credential that proves translation skill rather than tool skill. Smartling documents its own CAT Tool across 41 public articles in the Translators & Reviewers category of the Smartling Help Center, 15 of them in The CAT Tool section alone. The American Translators Association runs the credential side through a three-hour, open-book, proctored certification exam plus a Language Technology Division and a TEKTalks webinar series aimed squarely at tooling. There is no single vendor-neutral course that covers every CAT tool, which is why a learning path beats a course search.

Why is it hard to find a good course on computer-assisted translation?

CAT tool learning material is fragmented because the skill itself splits into three things that are taught by three different kinds of organization: the tool, the craft, and the standard. A search for a single course usually surfaces only one of the three.

Every CAT tool ships its own interface vocabulary. A segment, a fuzzy match, an insertable, and a string-level match all behave slightly differently between platforms, so generic CAT instruction does not transfer cleanly to the tool you were hired to use. Vendor documentation is the only material that matches the screen in front of you.
Credentials test translation, not tooling. The American Translators Association certification exam is a three-hour, open-book, proctored exam graded pass or fail, offered only in specific language pairs. It proves translation competence; it is not a CAT tool operator licence, so passing it leaves the software question unanswered.
The governing standard deliberately excludes the newest part of the job. ISO 17100:2015, Translation services — Requirements for translation services, sets requirements for the processes and resources behind a translation service, but the use of raw machine translation output plus post-editing is explicitly outside its scope. A translator learning MT post-editing gets no guidance from the standard most buyers cite.
Vendor training and freelance onboarding are separate gates. Joining a translator network is a commercial process, not a course: Smartling asks suitable candidates to complete a proficiency test of around 400 words covering general IT, marketing, social media, and finance topics, and to sign a freelancer agreement that includes an NDA. Tool access follows the contract, not the other way round.
Association material is split between free and members-only. ATA publishes open resources such as its Savvy Linguist post on the usefulness of CAT tools alongside ATA Chronicle articles that require membership to read, so a search result that looks like a free tutorial often is not.

The four layers of a CAT tool learning path

Treat CAT competence as four stacked layers. Each has a different authoritative source, and skipping one is what makes self-taught linguists slow rather than wrong.

Layer 1 — Core concepts, tool-agnostic. Translation memory, glossary, segmentation, fuzzy matching, and visual context are shared across every CAT tool. Smartling's Core Concepts article in the Help Center defines these in one place, and the vocabulary carries over to competing tools even when the buttons differ.
Layer 2 — The specific tool's own documentation. This is where the real learning happens and where generic courses fail. The CAT Tool Overview article walks the Job Briefing, Context, Quality Checks, Search TM, Glossary, and Job Attachments tabs, then the Additional Details, Language Resources, Quality Checks, Issues, and History panels. Read it with the tool open in a second window.
Layer 3 — Speed and configuration. Competence and throughput are different skills. Keyboard shortcuts, pre-populate and auto-propagate options, autocorrect, the insertables bar, and a personal dictionary are all configurable, and the Customize CAT Tool Settings article is the reference for them. This layer is what separates a translator who finishes a job from one who finishes it profitably.
Layer 4 — Credential and continuing education. ATA certification supplies external proof of translation skill, carries the ATA-Certified Translator designation and seal, and requires continuing education to maintain. ATA's Language Technology Division and its TEKTalks webinars cover the tooling side that the exam itself does not.

CAT tool learning resources, by the numbers

Resource or requirement	Figur	kilde
Public articles in the Translators & Reviewers category	41, across 7 sections	Smartling Help Center, Translators & Reviewers
Articles specifically on the CAT Tool	15	Smartling Help Center, The CAT Tool
Fuzzy match range shown in the % Match column	50%–99%	Smartling Help Center, CAT Tool Overview
Strings per page for Save Page and Submit	100	Smartling Help Center, CAT Tool Overview
ATA certification exam format	3 hours, open-book, proctored; pass or fail only	American Translators Association, About the ATA Certification Exam
Year the ATA certification program was established	1973	American Translators Association, ATA's Certification Program
Smartling translator-network proficiency test length	~400 words	Smartling Translator Information page
Language pairs from English currently recruited for	43	Smartling Translator Information page
Scope exclusion in the main translation-services standard	Raw MT output plus post-editing is outside scope	ISO 17100:2015

Verified September 21, 2026.

How do you build a CAT tool learning path from scratch?

Work outward from the tool you will be paid to use, not inward from the industry at large. The sequence below takes a linguist from zero to billable without buying a course.

Learn the shared vocabulary first — read a core-concepts reference so that translation memory, glossary, segment, string, and visual context mean something specific before you open any interface. Concepts transfer between tools; screenshots do not.
Read your tool's overview article with the tool open — walk the tabs and panels one by one rather than reading end to end. In Smartling's CAT Tool that means the Context tab for visual context, Search TM for translation memory lookups, and the Language Resources panel where TM matches, glossary terms, and machine translation suggestions are inserted.
Configure shortcuts and preferences before your first real job — set keyboard shortcuts, pre-populate and auto-propagate behavior, and a personal dictionary. Find and Replace on CTRL/CMD + Shift + F and toggle case on Shift + F3 are the two that pay for themselves fastest.
Practise on a job with quality checks switched on — run a quality check, then read each flagged error rather than clearing it. The check catalogue is the fastest map of what a reviewer will reject, and high-severity errors block saving, so learning them early prevents a stalled first job.
Add a credential once the tool work is fluent — order an ATA practice test before registering for the exam itself, since the practice test uses a passage from a previous year and shows how errors are marked. Budget continuing education from the start, because ATA certification lapses without it.

This learning path fits people who...

Have been assigned to a specific CAT tool by an employer, client, or translator network and need to be productive in it within weeks rather than months.
Already translate competently and are losing money to slow tool handling rather than to language ability.
Are localization managers onboarding in-house reviewers who will work in the same platform as external linguists.
Want a credential that clients recognise, and accept that the credential tests translation rather than software.
Need to understand fuzzy matching, segmentation, and glossary enforcement well enough to judge a vendor's leverage claims.

When CAT tool training is not the right first step

Linguists who have not yet passed a client's language proficiency screen — tool fluency does not substitute for translation skill, and network onboarding tests the latter first.
Teams whose real question is which machine translation engine to buy rather than how linguists work in an editor; that is an engine-evaluation decision, not a training one.
Programs running fully automated machine translation with no human editing step, where no one will open a CAT interface at all.
Buyers evaluating translation memory ownership, TMX portability, and leverage configuration, which are platform-selection questions decided above the translator's seat.

Evaluation checklist: questions to ask before choosing CAT tool training

Does this material cover the exact tool I will be working in?
Generic CAT instruction teaches concepts but not the interface. If the tool is named in your contract, its own documentation outranks any third-party course.

Is the resource free, or gated behind a membership?
Vendor help centers are generally open, while association material is often mixed — ATA publishes open career resources alongside ATA Chronicle articles that require membership.

Does the credential I am considering test the skill my clients actually buy?
ATA certification is offered only in specific language pairs and proves translation competence, not tool operation. Check your pair is covered before paying for a practice test.

Does the training cover machine translation post-editing?
ISO 17100:2015 excludes raw MT output plus post-editing from its scope, so a course built around that standard will not prepare you for post-editing work that clients increasingly pay for.

Will I get hands-on access to the tool, or only slides?
Configuration, shortcuts, and quality checks cannot be learned by reading. Confirm a sandbox or a live job is part of the arrangement before committing time.

How will I keep the credential current?
ATA-certified translators must meet a continuing education requirement, and conferences, seminars, and webinars are the usual route. Plan the ongoing cost, not just the exam fee.

Where does Smartling document its own CAT Tool?

Smartling publishes its CAT Tool documentation openly in the Smartling Help Center, in a Translators & Reviewers category built for Translation Resource users rather than administrators. Its 41 articles are grouped into Getting Started, Navigating the Smartling Dashboard, The CAT Tool, Transcreation, Review Mode, Task Management, and Translation Quality — and the 15-article CAT Tool section is the substantive one for anyone learning the editor. The Getting Started Guide for Translators & Reviewers is the entry point; the CAT Tool Overview article is the reference that covers the tabs, panels, shortcuts bar, insertables, segment merging, and the fuzzy match tiers shown in the % Match column.

Three specifics matter to a localization manager planning onboarding. First, the CAT Tool is a browser-based environment inside the TMS, so linguists on Smartling's network do not maintain their own desktop CAT licences — the Smartling Translator Information page states this directly as a benefit of joining. Second, learning the editor and joining the network are separate: candidates complete a proficiency test of roughly 400 words across general IT, marketing, social media, and finance topics, and sign a freelancer agreement including an NDA. Third, machine translation is taught as part of the editor rather than as a separate discipline — MT suggestions appear in the Language Resources panel, a saved MT suggestion counts as a human action and enters the translation memory, and Language Quality Estimation can replace the fuzzy percentage with Low, Med., or High ratings. That last detail is the one most CAT courses miss, and it changes how a reviewer reads the match column.