18 Best Free WordPress Multilingual Plugins for 2021
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Looking to translate your WordPress website into multiple languages? These WordPress translation plugins are here to help to do the task and make your website multilingual.
People all over the world do not speak the same language. And so, it’s always a good thing to make your website available in more than one language. First off, it’s a smart marketing strategy. It signals to a worldwide audience that you are looking for a wide reach and that you’re willing to take your content across borders and cultures. Not only that, it immediately makes your website appear truly international. Besides, reaching out to your target audience in their own language is most likely to increase subscribers, readers and customers, generate leads and increase revenues. As always with WordPress, there are plugins to help with every function. And for translation, you can rely on the many quality WordPress Multilingual Plugins.
If your website or blog has readers across the world, you may find it necessary to speak to your target audience in their own language. You may be aware that Google lets you translate anything instantly for free. To be able to publish content in different languages, you may want to actually translate it. Machines help you understand texts in different languages, but cannot fully translate texts in a manner that will appear native.
When you add a multilingual plugin to your site, the task of translating your website becomes much easier. These plugins work in two different ways. In the first method, the plugins access some online tool or service that automatically translates content. However, when it comes to machine translation, the quality of the translation may not be up to the level you desire. In the second method, you’ll need to rewrite every bit of content on your website in the languages you want, and the plugins will help users switch between different language versions. Of course, the quality of the translation will be much better in this method. Many plugins offer a combination of the two methods.
If you want to learn more about how to make your WordPress multilingual you might want to read this detailed guide.
Premium WordPress Multilingual Plugins
There’s a lone premium only plugin on our list and it’s the old favorite WPML. While most free plugins come with a premium version making them freemium this plugin, however, WPML doesn’t have a free version and it is a true premium plugin and that clearly reflects in its quality, feature set, and level of support.
WPML (Most Popular)
WordPress Multilingual Plugin (WPML) is a popular translation plugin that can handle the translation needs of any website, be it a small blog or a huge corporate website. It helps translate content into 40+ languages and run them all off a single WordPress install. And because it allows you to place each language version on the same domain or sub-domain, it’s a good fit for multisites. You can also locate different translation versions on totally different domains.
WPML works equally well with both translation methods. It syncs with translation services for auto-translation. For this purpose, you can send your content right from your WordPress dashboard to the service you select, and the translated version is returned to you. At the same time, it supports manual translations via the WPML’s translation editor or using your own desktop software. Using the editor, you can also add specific language variants. Where WPML scores is in syncing menu translations, translating pages created with page builders, SEO features, integration with translation services, flexible language URLs and RTL editing. The plugin is compatible with most standard WordPress themes and plugins
WPML will also ensure you continue to have an optimal site performance on your website. It has updated its popular String Translation meaning page load times have been reduced by more than 50%. They’re so confident of this development that they are willing to offer a 12-month performance guarantee with anyone experiencing unresolved problems getting their money back.
To use the plugin, you’ll need to purchase a license. The licenses range between $29 (ideal for a multilingual blog) and $195 (ideal for a multilingual CMS, required if you’re building multi-language sites for clients). It’s the higher-end licenses that provide the full range of features such as translation widgets and multilingual eCommerce support (with WooCommerce Mulitilingual). The multilingual eCommerce feature shows you which texts need translation and builds the complete translated store for you. They also help with translating the WordPress backend and creating Translator roles. So, if you have team members speaking different languages, this can prove to be a helpful feature.
Why we love it?
We use it for several of our projects because it is fast, easy to use and it offers limitless options to translate your website in a way you want. It is also the most popular multilingual solution for WordPress making it very easy to find tutorials outside already very detailed documentation and incredible support that WPML provides. You can’t go wrong by choosing it!
TranslatePress
TranslatePress is a WordPress multilingual plugin that offers a quick and easy translation process of your website. With TranslatePress, you can create bilingual and multilingual sites without hassle. What’s cool about the tool is that you get to translate your page’s content from the front end. From forms, shortcodes, elements and other components, you can change all the texts effortlessly. Besides, TranslatePress is a self-hosted plugin so you keep your translations eternally.
Moreover, TranslatePress is also compatible with WooCommerce and all the modern WordPress themes you can find on the market today. It also displays a live preview so you do not need to jump back and forth when making changes. This process alone allows you to swiftly and comfortably translate your page or blog. Last but not least, TranslatePress fully supports the new Gutenberg block builder.
Free WordPress Multilingual Plugins
The plugins in this post are almost entirely sourced from the WordPress directory, as there are so many free and efficient free translation plugins available there. Most plugins adopt a combination method, allowing automatic translation as well as manual editing/translation from scratch.
Polylang
Polylang is an easy to use plugin. This plugin needs you to translate content by yourself without hooking up to any translation service. Therefore, it’s a good fit if you want to create and manage multiple language versions on your own or by hiring help. You can write post and pages, and create categories and tags the normal way, and then specify the language for each.
You can choose from close to a hundred languages on the settings screen. Not only that, you can choose the appearance of the name of the language on your screen and add the appropriate country flag. Then, go ahead and translate any post or page you want. You can translate all or only some of the pages and posts. Each language is identified with a two-letter code, and this code forms part of the unique URL of each language version. Using a widget, users can switch from one language to another. A premium plugin with additional features starting at $99 is also available.
The Lingotek plugin teams up nicely with Polylang to offer translation services. If you are using WPML and want to make the switch to Polylang, there’s a dedicated plugin that will help.
Translate WordPress with GTranslate
Translate WordPress with GTranslate relies on Google Translate automatic translation service to translate your website into 104 languages. That makes your website available to almost 99% of the internet users. It combines automatic and human translations to make it easy for you to carry out translations. It hides the Google top frame after translation, as well as the suggestion to offer better translations. Besides pages and posts, it translates menus, widgets, categories, tags, themes and plugins and includes RTL support. A floating language selector that lazy loads country flags is also included. The menu items can carry country flags alongside and WooCommerce shops can be fully translated.
The premium version pays a great deal of attention to SEO and is designed to increase the international reach of your website. It allows manual correction of the translations and adds in-context translation feature. It allows you to have subdirectory or subdomain URL structure, translates for AMP pages, translates media and provides Live Chat support.
Weglot Translate
Weglot Translate uses an intuitive API to detect any content on your website, and translates it into one of 60 languages. The automatic translation serves as a base version, which you can manually edit using a Contextual Editor in your Weglot account. A helpful feature for content heavy sites is that you can mark phrases as reviewed. This avoids repeat translation and saves you time. To improve quality in translation, you can choose to go with professional translation services from Weglot.
After installing the plugin on your website, you’ll need to create an account with Weglot and obtain an API key. Specify the original language of your website and the language of translation. You can exclude pages and content blocks from translation. Once you save the changes, language option buttons appear on the frontend. Users can switch buttons to view content in any of the language options you offer.
The Plugin complies with Google’s best practices for multilingual WordPress websites. It assigns unique URLs automatically to the new language pages. The plugin automatically detects and translates title, description, meta tags, categories, etc. With Weglot Translate, a user visiting the translated pages enjoys the same experience as a user on the original language pages. It maintains the selected language throughout the entire website. Site Admins can change the appearance and location of the language buttons.
Weglot is available for free for small websites (up to 2000 words). For other websites, the price you pay depends on the number of words needing translation and the number of language options you need. All packages have access to Pro translation services. If you exceed the word count of your current package, you’ll automatically be upgraded to the next package, without any interruption in service.
WooCommerce Multilingual
WooCommerce Multilingual unlocks a new solution that offers to run your thriving WooCommerce website with WPML. You can now translate your web space in multiple languages without a sweat. meaning, you can globalize the experience of your online store. It also enables you to run your eCommerce platform by accepting different currencies. With this WordPress multilingual plugin, you can translate all your products on a simple, variable, grouped or external basis.
Do you know what is best? The simplicity of the plugin encourages you to do it all by yourself. Nope, no need to hire someone to do it for you. Along with item translation, you can also send out emails to customers and admins in their language so the experience stays intact. By the way, while WooCommerce Multilingual is compatible with different themes, it also supports all sorts of modern WooCommerce plugins.
Multisite Language Switcher
As the name suggests, Multisite Language Switcher is a free WordPress Multilingual plugin that lets you switch between languages in an instant. With the WordPress multisite feature in combination with Multisite Language Switcher, you can now create your own hub of websites that you can run in different languages with ease. To get things moving forward, download the tool, install and activate it in your plugins section of your WordPress admin and you are ready to roll. For your information, you need to activate Multisite Language Switcher plugin in each blog individually.
You can now connect your translated posts and pages, as well as categories and tags and use a widget, a Gutenberg block or a shortcode. For any additional information, you can always access the support forum and save yourself time and energy.
Polylang Connect for Elementor
When speaking about Polylang Connect for Elementor plugin, you do not really need much introduction. This WordPress Multilingual plugin connects the excellent Polylang plugin with the remarkable Elementor drag and drop page builder. You can now quickly switch between languages and make all sorts of template tweaks that you would like to perform.
You can configure settings for each language individually or you can set some content globally (like a title) and keep all the rest exclusive to the language of choice. For a better understanding, make sure you visit live preview page and see it in action. What’s more, you can upgrade to the plus plan at any time and gain access to even more practical features. Let the tools do the major part of the work for you.
Google Website Translator
Google Translate is a popular and handy tool to translate any kind of content that you need into more than a hundred languages. What’s more, it’s free for use. The translations are automatic and rather basic. Google Website Translator harnesses the power of this Google tool to translate the content of any WordPress website. After installing and activating the plugin, you need to specify your original language and the languages to which you need translations. You can select all the languages on offer as well. The translation then happens automatically.
Using shortcodes, you can insert a widget in any post or sidebar. Users can interact with the widget to select a language from a dropdown or by clicking on the country flag. Within seconds, you’ll see the entire content of your website appear in the language of choice. You can exclude parts of your website from translation. When it comes to choosing styles for your widget, four options are available. And the simple settings with inline editing to help makes setup really easy. Once you configure the plugin, you can export the settings to other sites as well. And finally, the plugin is fast-acting, because it does not load any external files, no unnecessary JavaScript and CSS files.
Lingotek Translation
Lingotek Translation is not a standalone plugin. It works in conjunction with Polylang and complements it by providing the necessary language skills. Lingotek is a top-notch, cloud-based translation network that offers three types of translation services. The first is a free machine translation up to 100,000 characters, and the second is community translation where you can translate content using a Lingotek text editor. The third option is to go with Lingotek’s professional translation services, with the help of professional translators. The last option ensures top-notch translation quality.
You need to create a Lingotek account to work with this plugin. What the plugin does for you is to transfer your content to Lingotek’s servers for translation. You can watch the progress in a progress bar. Thereafter, the translated content is returned to your website. You can create posts, pages, media, categories, post tags, menus, and widgets, and specify the language for each. Further, you can use a different subdomain or domain per language. To make it easy for users, add a language switcher in the menu or as a widget. Above all, the WordPress admin area can also be in any language you select.
Google Language Translator
Translating a WordPress website need not be complicated once you have the right tools at hand. With Google Language Translator, you can get the job done pretty quickly, thanks to the powerful machine that does the job automatically for you. Exactly, you do not really need to do much work other than set the configuration and that’s it. Basically, you set it up and forget it.
As for the free package, you get features, like hiding Google top frame, translating menus and widgets, as well as themes and plugins, RTL support and floating language selector. With Google Language Translator, you can also translate a WooCommerce website. Once you find in need of even more features, you can always step things up with the premium plan. Fun fact: Google Language Translator powers over half a million websites, meaning, it is doing something extremely well.
BuddyPress Multilingual
If you would like to run a multilingual BuddyPress website, here is a WordPress plugin that does the trick free of charge. BuddyPress Multilingual is a nifty, easy to use and powerful tool that offers translations for BuddyPress pages with WPML. Whether you run a single- or a multi-site installation, BuddyPress Multilingual works with both without a hitch. Instead of wandering around, not knowing how to approach the translation of a forum or community website, you can now do it like a champ with BuddyPress Multilingual.
Some of the features include language switching, email notifications translation and keeps the entire BuddyPress flow operate in the current language. If you need any additional assistance and help, you can always get in touch with BuddyPress Multilingual’s support. Take your BuddyPress website to another degree with the help of BuddyPress Multilingual.
Loco Translate
Loco Translate is an excellent multilingual WordPress plugin that fully supports PO and MO files. With the user-friendly in-browser editing, you can take care of translation files in a little breeze. You do all the work from within your admin dashboard, not needing to use any 3rd-party platforms and whatnot. On top of that, Loco Translate also equips you with localization tools if you are a developer, like extracting strings and generating templates.
You can create and update language files in your theme or plugin directly. This way, you benefit from the protected language directory when you would like to save custom translations. Manage and maintain localization or globalization of your WordPress website or blog with Loco Translate now and never run into issues again.
Multilanguage by BestWebSoft
Multilanguage by BestWebSoft helps you create content, categories and tags in the normal way. Thereafter, you can assign languages to each piece of content. It supports 80 languages, and you can add more if you wish, as well as select a default language. There’s an option to search the website in the current language only or in all the language versions. A language switcher with multiple options for styling and country flag icons are also available.
The plugin works by using WordPress filters, so it’s compatible only with themes and plugins that adhere to the WordPress codex standards. Another point to note is, it does not hook up with any translation service, so you’ll have to do translations yourself or by hiring help.
Pro features include switching languages automatically based on the visitor’s IP, translating widget title and website title and tagline, creating separate menus for different languages and more.
WPGlobus
WPGlobus allows you to manually translate posts, pages, categories, tags, menus, and widgets. This plugin offers all the basic features necessary for translating your site and managing the translations. It comes with a frontend language switcher, as well as an option to change the language on the admin interface from the top bar.
This plugin is part of a group of plugins that helps with transforming your site into a multilingual one. It allows you to add one or more languages and supports Yoast SEO and All-in-One SEO Pack. Free add-ons are available for setting featured image separately for each language. Add-ons also enable this plugin on themes that use Visual Composer and impart multilingual editing capabilities to the visual editor widget. Premium add-ons are necessary for translating URLs, for language-specific keywords, for translating WooCommerce and more.
And Finally
English is popular, but not everybody understands it all over the world. Surely, it makes sense to have a multilingual website to reach a wider global audience. With these WordPress translation plugins, it’s not really hard to translate your website and make it multilingual. As a side benefit, they have the potential to boost your search engine rankings. Multilingual sites are a great option for blogs and websites such as job boards and travel sites. They can be of great help while launching products or services in new markets and give you brand visibility in new geographies.
We’ve pretty much covered the top plugins, but if your favorite is not on this list, let us know in the comments below.
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