Machine translation post-editing is a hybrid workflow: a machine translation engine produces the first draft, and professional linguists revise it until it meets an agreed quality level. Industry practice distinguishes light post-editing (make it accurate and understandable) from full post-editing (make it indistinguishable from human translation).
The appeal is economics. For high-volume, low-risk content — product data sheets, internal documentation, knowledge bases — MTPE can cut cost by 30–50% and turnaround by half compared with translating from scratch, with no visible quality difference after full post-editing.
The catch is suitability. Creative marketing copy, legal texts, and safety-critical instructions rarely benefit: the machine draft anchors the linguist’s thinking, and correcting it takes as long as translating fresh. Honest vendors assess content before recommending MTPE, and say which workflow your quote is based on.
At MediaLocalize, MTPE is one workflow among several, chosen per project. Technical documentation and catalogs often qualify; brand copy and regulatory content go to fully human translation. Either way, every sentence passes a native-speaker review before delivery.