How to Change WooCommerce Language: 4 Methods

Translating your store can be a good way to reach a global audience. If that’s your case, we’ve got something for you. In this post, we will show you how to change the WooCommerce language and improve your store’s visibility.

Why Change the Language of Your Store?

WooCommerce’s default language is English. Although English is often regarded as the “international” language, in reality, many people don’t speak it. If most of your users aren’t fluent in English, consider changing your store’s language.

TIP: When targeting international markets, choose a hosting provider like AccuWeb Hosting with servers in multiple locations to ensure fast loading speeds for customers worldwide.

The main benefit of changing the language is that you can tailor your site to your audience, providing them with a better experience.

If you only sell products to English-speaking countries such as the United States, the UK, or Australia, it makes sense that you set up your store in English. On the other hand, if you target non-English countries or a global audience, you might want to consider making your store multilingual. For instance, if you’re selling to Latin America and Spain, consider changing your WooCommerce store’s language to Spanish.

By simply adjusting the language, you can provide users with a better experience, boosting your sales and revenue. Finally, if you sell products worldwide, offering a language switch option is a significant advantage.

Now that we have a better understanding of the benefits, let’s explore how you can change the language of your store.

Tips and Best Practices for WooCommerce Multilingual Stores

• Always backup your site before changing languages or installing translation plugins.
• Test translations on a staging site first, especially for checkout pages and dynamic content.
• Use a dedicated multilingual plugin for full control over product titles, descriptions, and other custom content.
• Place a visible language switcher on your store, ideally in the header, menu, or sidebar, so users can easily select their preferred language.
• Keep currency and tax settings consistent across languages to avoid confusion for international customers.
• Optimize SEO for each language with translated URLs, metadata, and hreflang tags.
• Regularly update translations after adding new products, pages, or categories to maintain a consistent user experience.

How to Change the WooCommerce Language

There are four main ways to change the language of your WooCommerce store:

1. Change the language of the dashboard
2. Install a language manually
3. Change the language of the store
4. Create a multilingual store

Each method has specific pros and cons. Let’s take a closer look at each option so you can choose the one that best suits your needs.

1) Change the Language of the WooCommerce Dashboard

In this section, you’ll learn how to set English as your store’s primary language while using another language in the backend. This is particularly helpful for individuals who don’t speak English and need to manage the back end.

For example, you can display your store in English on the front end but use German on the back end.

First, log in to your WordPress dashboard and go to Settings > General.

Scroll to the bottom, and you will see the Site Language section.

Changing the language there will modify your entire website’s language. From here, you can also install additional languages on your site. For this demonstration, we’ll set up the website selecting Deutsch (German) as the WordPress backend language. Look for the language in the list, select it, and install it on your site.

If everything goes well, WordPress will change your default backend language to Deutsch (German), as you can see below.

The current configuration will change both the back-end and front-end languages. However, we want to keep the front-end in English. To do that, you need to do something else.

Go to Dashboard > Updates > Translations and press Upload Translations. Next, return to Settings > General and select the desired language from the drop-down. 

Then, go to Users > Profile, where you will find an option to change the user’s language. By default, the user is configured to the site’s language, but you can change it.

Click on it, and you will see all the installed languages in the dropdown. Select the language you want to use in the back-end and save the settings.

Keep in mind that this will only apply to your WordPress account. If other team members have access to your dashboard, they must select their preferred language from their profile settings.

That’s it! From now on, your website visitors will see the default language on the front end, while the other language you chose will be displayed on the back end.

2) How to Install a Language Manually

WordPress is the most popular CMS, which is why it has translations in many languages. However, sometimes you may want to use a language that’s not available in WordPress. In that case, you need to install the language manually.

To complete this task, you need to download the language files, access your website files through cPanel/an FTP client or a dedicated file manager plugin, and complete the manual upload.

Let’s have a look at this process step by step.

To begin, open the WordPress translate section and scroll to the bottom. There, you will see all the available languages you can install on the website. From the archive, find your preferred language and click on the percentage link. For example, let’s say we want to translate our site to Serbian.

Inside the individual language page, you will see five columns:

• Set/Sub Project: Different sections of the plugin
• Translated: Strings that are translated
• Fuzzy: Strings that need adjustments
• Untranslated: Parts of the plugin that aren’t translated
• Waiting: Strings that need approval from someone from the WordPress translation team

Download the Development project from there. Then, scroll to the bottom until you see the export options. From there, select .mo (Machine Object message Catalog) as the file type and complete the export.

A .mo file will be downloaded to your local storage. That is the language file you need to install on your site. To begin the installation, you need an FTP client such as FileZilla or cPanel access. Alternatively, you can use a file manager plugin.

Install a language manually with the File Manager

For this demo purpose, we will use File Manager, so first, we have to install and activate the plugin on our website.

Next, open the plugin’s settings and navigate to the wp-content folder.

In some cases, there will be a folder called languages. If your installation comes with that folder, you can skip this step. If your site doesn’t have a languages folder, you’ll need to create one manually.

Open the folder and upload the language .mo file you downloaded in the previous step.

After completing the upload, go back to your WordPress dashboard and head to Settings > General. From the language settings, you will see the newly installed language.

Select it from the dropdown and update the settings to apply it to your site. This way, you can install as many languages as you want.

As shown in the screenshot above, we have successfully updated the WordPress installation language to Serbian.

This is how you can change the WooCommerce language by manually installing the language pack.

3) Change the Language of the Store

If you want to use a single language on your WooCommerce store, this section is for you. Using a single language is the simplest option and appropriate when the backend and frontend of your site don’t require different languages.

The good news is that changing the language of your site is quite simple. In your WordPress dashboard, go to General > Settings, then look for the Site Language option.

When you click the dropdown, you will see the available languages you can install on your site.

Select the language you want to use in your store and save the settings. This will change both the backend and frontend language of your site.

Regularly update your translations to keep your store current using the Update Translations button.

This is how you can easily modify the language of your store.

4) Create a Multilingual Store

The last option to change the language of your WooCommerce store is to create a multilingual store. This is an interesting option for those businesses that sell products or services worldwide.

With a multilingual store, you can translate your store into different languages and display the frontend in the appropriate language for each user. By doing so, you can provide visitors with a better experience, which in turn will help increase your sales.

To create a multilingual store, you need to set up WooCommerce and a translation plugin correctly. For this tutorial, we will use Loco Translate, one of the best free translation plugins.

Install and activate Loco Translate

First, install and activate Loco Translate on your WooCommerce store.

After activating the plugin, you will see the settings on the left-hand side. To translate the WooCommerce plugin, navigate to Plugins under Loco Translate. There, you will see all your installed plugins and you have to select WooCommerce.

There will be no languages by default, so you need to create a new language.

You will see a configuration wizard where you must select a language and choose a location for storing the file. For example, let’s say you have a lot of customers from the Middle East so you want to translate your store into Arabic. Select Arabic from the dropdown, the storage location, and then click Start translating

The system will start translating the content. Depending on the size of your site, this may take a few minutes, so you may have to wait a little bit.

After the translation finishes, save the settings and that’s it! You have created a multilingual store and changed the language of your WooCommerce site. 

To translate your store into additional languages, follow the same process and select the languages you need.

NOTE: Keep an eye on updates so that whenever the WooCommerce plugin releases a new version, you update the translated files too to ensure everything is translated.

Best WordPress Translation Plugins

If you want to translate your WooCommerce store manually, you have two options:

• Hire an expert
• Use a dedicated translation plugin

Hiring an expert can be more expensive, and the quality may not always be excellent. If you’re going to have someone translate your plugin, we recommend finding a native speaker with strong experience translating software. 

Alternatively, if you are on a tight budget and want to save on translation costs, consider using a dedicated plugin. There are many translation tools available, and some are free.

If you are looking for the best WordPress translation plugins, some of the ones we can recommend are:

• WPML
• Polylang
• Weglot
• Loco Translate
• TranslatePress
• MultilingualPress

All these plugins are easy to use and come with cutting-edge features. Have a look at them and choose the one that best suits your needs and budget.

Let’s have a quick look at the top 3 options.

1. WPML

WPML is a comprehensive and powerful multilingual plugin for WordPress, designed to help you create and manage multilingual websites with ease. It supports over 65 languages and lets you translate posts, pages, custom post types, taxonomies, menus, and even the theme’s text.

WPML offers both manual and automatic translation options, providing flexibility to suit your needs. The plugin integrates seamlessly with most themes and plugins, ensuring a smooth experience.

WPML also includes features like translation management, language switchers, and compatibility with popular SEO plugins, making it a robust solution for building multilingual websites.

Features

• Supports over 65 languages, including RTL languages.
• Allows translation of posts, pages, custom post types, taxonomies, menus, and theme texts.
• Provides both manual and automatic translation options.
• Includes translation management features for efficient workflow.
• Offers customizable language switchers for easy navigation.
• Compatible with most themes and plugins, ensuring seamless integration.
• Integrates with popular SEO plugins for optimized multilingual content.

Pros

• Comprehensive translation capabilities for all site content.
• Flexible translation options to suit different workflows.
• User-friendly interface for managing translations.
• Regular updates and active support from the WPML team.

Cons

• Premium plugin with a cost that may be a consideration for some users.
• Some users report a learning curve due to the extensive features.

Pricing

WPML is a premium plugin with pricing plans starting from €39/year for the Blog plan, €99/year for the CMS plan, and €199/year for the Agency plan. All plans include one year of support and updates.

2. Polylang

Polylang is a popular multilingual plugin for WordPress that allows you to create a bilingual or multilingual website. It enables you to translate posts, pages, categories, tags, and custom post types into different languages.

The plugin integrates seamlessly with WordPress, offering a user-friendly interface for managing translations. Polylang supports both manual and automatic translation methods, providing flexibility for site owners.

It also offers features such as customizable language switchers and compatibility with popular SEO plugins, ensuring your multilingual content is optimized for search engines.

Features

• Translate posts, pages, categories, tags, and custom post types.
• Supports manual and automatic translation methods.
• Customizable language switchers for easy navigation.
• Compatibility with popular SEO plugins.
• Integration with WordPress for a seamless user experience.

Pros

• User-friendly interface suitable for beginners.
• Offers both manual and automatic translation options.
• Regular updates and active community support.
• Compatible with most WordPress themes and plugins.

Cons

• Some advanced features require the Pro version.
• May require additional configuration for complex multilingual setups.

Pricing

Polylang is a freemium plugin. The free version offers essential multilingual features, while the Pro version, priced at €99/year, provides advanced functionalities and premium support.

3. Weglot

Weglot Translate is one of the most popular and user-friendly translation plugins for WordPress and WooCommerce. It automatically detects your website content and translates it into more than 110 languages with no coding required.

The plugin ensures that your entire store, including products, checkout pages, and dynamic content, appears in your chosen languages instantly. It also handles multilingual SEO by generating dedicated URLs and translating metadata to improve visibility in global search results.

Weglot integrates seamlessly with most themes, page builders, and plugins, making it an excellent choice for store owners who want to reach an international audience quickly.

Features

• Automatic translation for posts, pages, menus, and WooCommerce products.
• Visual editor for manual translations and glossary management.
• SEO ready with hreflang tags and translated meta information.
• Syncs new content automatically for real-time updates.
• Works with most WordPress themes and plugins.

Pros

• Quick setup that helps you launch a multilingual store in minutes.
• Accurate translations with manual editing options.
• Supports over 110 languages with SEO optimization.
• Simple interface and powerful translation management dashboard.

Cons

• Pricing increases with higher translation volume.
• Requires an active Weglot account for the translation API.

Pricing

Weglot is a freemium plugin. It offers a limited free plan, and premium plans start from around €15 per month for more features and higher translation limits.

Troubleshooting Common Language Issues in WooCommerce

• Some texts remain in English – Verify the WordPress site language under Settings → General → Site Language. Use a multilingual plugin for product titles, descriptions, and custom content.
• Language switcher does not appear – Ensure your plugin’s language switcher is enabled and correctly placed via a widget, menu, or shortcode.
• Checkout or cart pages stay untranslated – Confirm your translation plugin supports WooCommerce and that these pages are included in the translation workflow.
• Only parts of the site are translated – Use the plugin’s string translation or glossary feature to translate custom theme or plugin strings manually.
• Automatic translation errors – Review auto-translations in the visual editor and manually adjust product names or marketing content if needed.
• Multilingual SEO issues – Make sure each language version has unique URLs, translated metadata, and correct hreflang tags.

Frequently Asked Questions

Now, we will take a look at some frequently asked questions about this topic.

Conclusion

All in all, translating your site can help you offer a better customer experience and increase your sales. In this guide, we’ve seen four ways to change the language in WooCommerce:

1. Change the language of the dashboard
2. Install a language manually
3. Change the language of the whole store
4. Create a multilingual store

The easiest way is to change the language of the entire store, which will affect both the frontend and the backend. Alternatively, if you want to use a different language for the frontend and the backend, you can change the dashboard language.

If you want to translate your store into a language that’s not available in WordPress, you’ll need to install the language pack manually.

Finally, if you sell to multiple markets worldwide, creating a multilingual store is your best option. And the best part is that you can use free plugins to do so.

Have you translated your site?

Which method did you use?

Let us know in the comments below!

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