About NVIDIA NMT NIM Microservice#
The NVIDIA Neural Machine Translation (NMT) NIM microservice translates text between languages. It packages the Riva Translate 1.6b model, a Transformer-based encoder-decoder with 24 encoder and 24 decoder layers, into a self-contained container that handles model download, optimization, and serving.
The Riva Translate 1.6b model supports any-to-any translation across 36 languages, including English, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Arabic, Hindi, and major European languages. For the full language list, refer to the NMT support matrix.
Key Capabilities#
Translation Exclusion#
Protect terms from translation using <dnt> (do not translate) tags. Brand names, product names, and technical terms enclosed in <dnt>...</dnt> pass through unchanged while the surrounding text is translated normally.
--text "<dnt>NVIDIA NIM</dnt> provides optimized inference."
Custom Dictionaries#
Provide a dictionary file to force specific translations or block translation of specific words. Each entry maps a source word to a target word (source##target) or marks a word to leave untranslated (word with no ##). This gives fine-grained control over domain-specific terminology.
Batch Inference#
Translate multiple inputs in parallel using the --batch-size flag with a text file containing one input per line. Batching improves throughput when translating large volumes of text.
Morphologically Complex Languages#
Some target languages (Arabic, Turkish, Finnish) produce longer output than the source text. If output is truncated, increase the --max-len-variation parameter (default: 20, range: 0-256) to allow longer translations.
Next Steps#
Deploy and Run NMT NIM: Deploy the NMT NIM container and run translation with the CLI client.
Custom Dictionaries: Force specific translations or protect domain terms from translation.
Translate with Python: Call the NMT gRPC API programmatically.
NMT Tutorial: Guided walkthrough of deployment, exclusion tags, custom dictionaries, and batch inference.
NMT Support Matrix: GPU requirements, model profiles, and all 36 supported languages.