Certified translation

Arabic certified translation for USCIS

Every message translated beside the original, with the Certificate of Translation Accuracy that 8 CFR 103.2(b)(3) asks for. Arabic is written in Arabic and runs right to left, and 22 regional varieties are recorded under it separately.

Writing system: Arabic
Direction: Right to left
Spoken in: 7 countries
Varieties recorded: 22
Measured quality: chrF 0.46 against a public corpus

Where Arabic is spoken

EgyptSaudi ArabiaIraqMoroccoSudanAlgeriaSyria

What to call yours

Clients rarely say “Arabic”. They say the name they grew up with, and it usually resolves the script, the vocabulary and sometimes the direction in one word. These are recorded separately so nobody has to know which language their own dialect is filed under.

Variety	Script	Direction	Spoken in	What a translator needs to know
Algerian Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Algeria	Darja; Maghrebi, heavy French influence.
Algerian Darija	Arabic	Right to left	Algeria	Algerian Arabic; Maghrebi.
Chadian Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Chad	—
Darija	Arabic	Right to left	Morocco, Algeria	Moroccan or Algerian Arabic; say which.
Egyptian Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Egypt	Masri. The most widely understood dialect across the region because of film and television.
Gulf Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, UAE, Saudi Arabia	Khaleeji: Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, UAE, eastern Saudi Arabia.
Hassaniya	Arabic	Right to left	Mauritania, Western Sahara	Mauritania and Western Sahara.
Iraqi Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Iraq	Mesopotamian; Baghdadi differs from southern.
Jordanian Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Jordan	Levantine.
Lebanese Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Lebanon	Levantine; heavy French borrowing.
Levantine Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine	Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine.
Libyan Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Libya	Maghrebi.
Modern Standard Arabic	Arabic	Right to left		Written register.
Moroccan Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Morocco	Darija. Far from Modern Standard Arabic — a translator who reads Levantine may not read this.
Moroccan Darija	Arabic	Right to left	Morocco	Moroccan Arabic. Far from Modern Standard Arabic — a translator who reads Levantine may not read this.
Msa	Arabic	Right to left		Modern Standard Arabic: written, not spoken at home. If the pages are chat, they are probably dialect.
Palestinian Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Palestine, Israel	Levantine.
Saudi Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Saudi Arabia	Najdi and Hijazi differ from each other.
Sudanese Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Sudan	—
Syrian Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Syria	Levantine.
Tunisian Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Tunisia	Derja; Maghrebi, heavy French and Berber influence.
Yemeni Arabic	Arabic	Right to left	Yemen	Conservative; retains features others lost.

What USCIS actually requires

8 CFR 103.2(b)(3) is the whole of it: a full English translation, certified by the translator as complete and accurate, together with their certification that they are competent to translate from Arabic into English.

There is no approved-translator list, no credential requirement and no notarisation mandate — notarisation attests to a signature, not to accuracy. Summaries are not permitted at all, which is why a Arabic chat exhibit is produced message by message however long the conversation runs. What “USCIS approved” actually means.

What it costs

One record is $499, certified, whatever its length — a four-year conversation costs what a four-month one costs. Agencies commonly charge by the page and define a page as 250 words, which is survivable for a birth certificate and ruinous for a chat export. The arithmetic on 100 pages.

Certified translation for USCIS See pricing

Arabic is one of 167 languages across 26 writing systems. The full list, and all 98 regional varieties, is on the languages page and in the variety table.