Shopify Translate and Adapt Help: Language Review and Setup

Adding a language takes minutes. Making it read like your own store in that language takes longer.

A fluent pass before publishing. Shopify tells merchants to review automatic translations for accuracy before they go live. A native speaker works through product titles, collections and the cart path in the side-by-side editor. Their edits stick, because automatic translation never changes text you added or edited manually.

Policies done by hand. Legal policies can't be translated automatically, so refund, privacy and terms pages need a human translation in every published language.

Market-specific wording. Adaptations change spelling, messaging, images or logos for one market that shares a language with another. They depend on a market plan, which Markets localization specialists usually set up first.

Handles that read well. URL handles can be translated, though not per market, and the word "products" in the path stays as it is. Settle handles with someone who does Shopify SEO before Google indexes the new language.

Theme and app strings. Third-party themes need checking with their developer, custom themes need the routes Liquid object for internal links, and app text only translates if the app stores it as a Shopify translatable resource.

Bulk edits by CSV. Email templates, metafields, filters and shop policies don't show in the app's search. Shopify points to CSV export for those.

Doing it yourself. One extra language, a free Shopify theme and a colleague who speaks it well: that store rarely needs a paid hire.

Language skill and Shopify skill rarely come in one person. Decide which of the two you are paying for, then test for it.

Ask who reads the output. A good answer names a native speaker per language and a short glossary for product terms that must stay consistent. "The AI handles it" is not a review process.

Ask about your allowance. They should know the auto-translation cap depends on the country your store is in, that removing a language doesn't free a slot, and that an automatic translation can't be moved to another language. Choosing the wrong language spends an allowance you won't get back.

Ask how URLs will look. Expect a view on subfolders or subdomains, translated handles, and redirects if handles change after launch.

Ask what the app leaves out. Tags, collection filters, product images, manual payment instructions and Shopify Forms content sit outside it. Someone who knows that list prices the workarounds up front.

Hold back on any quote promising every theme and app string translated before anyone has checked which of your apps use the Translations API.

A small paid start. One collection and its products translated and reviewed in one language, with a note on each term they changed and why.

The auto-translation cap follows your address. Stores in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland or the UK can auto-translate up to 8 languages beyond the default. Elsewhere the cap is 2, unless the app shows a "Translate now" button for your store.

Auto-sync is regional. Where offered, it retranslates a language weekly. It is off by default, set per language, and its first run waits for the next weekly slot. Other stores click Auto-translate again after content changes.

Theme text only fills gaps. For theme default text, missing translations are added and existing ones are left alone.

Your plan sets the language count. Basic, Grow, Shopify and Advanced allow up to 20 languages. Plus allows up to 30.

Not every language works. Shopify lists 14 incompatible languages, among them Tagalog, Latin and Haitian Creole.

Default SEO fields follow the product. Product meta titles and descriptions left on default settings pull from the translated title and description.

Uninstalling keeps everything. Translations stay in the store after removal. Delete them in the app first, or later through a CSV export and import.

Most multilingual launches on the native app break down into a few of these jobs.