Literal translation, also known as direct translation in everyday usage has the meaning of the rendering of text from one language to another "word-for-word" (Latin: "verbum pro verbo") rather than conveying the sense of the original. However in translation studies literal translation has the meaning of technical translation of scientific, technical, technological or legal texts. ^[1] Other term for literal translation in translation theory is metaphrase and the prasal ("sense" translation) is paraphrase.

When considered a bad practise of conveying word by word (lexeme to lexeme or morpheme to lexeme) translation of non-technical type literal translations has the meaning of mis-translating idioms ^[2], for example, or in the context of translating an analytic language to a synthetic language, it renders even the grammar unintelligible.

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