Adding a language to a Shopify store takes a few clicks. Making it read as if someone local wrote it takes a person.
A Shopify translator works on the words you own: product titles and descriptions, collection copy, navigation, policies, notification emails and metafields. Shopify supplies checkout translations for the languages it supports, and its free themes ship with translated default text, so most of the budget goes on your content. Taglines and ads call for transcreation, which rewrites the idea for a native reader instead of converting sentences.
Setup is a different service. Creating markets, adding languages and choosing domains or subfolders sits with Markets and localisation setup specialists, and deciding which countries to enter is international expansion strategy.
Describe your project — languages, a rough word count and what the copy has to do — to request a quote.
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Hire per language. Professional translators work into their native language, and one language can differ by market, as Brazilian and European Portuguese do. If one supplier offers every language you need, ask who translates each one and whether that person is a native speaker; the answer shows whether the work is being passed on.
Pay for a test on your hardest page. Pick a product with specs, sizing and a line of brand voice, and have it translated as a paid sample. Show the result to a native speaker you trust, ideally a customer, before handing over the catalogue.
Look for your category’s vocabulary. Garment care, cosmetic ingredients and electrical specs each have terms a general translator gets subtly wrong. Ask for past work in your category, in the target language, and how they handle terms with no direct equivalent.
Agree how translations reach the store. They can go in directly through Shopify’s Translate & Adapt app or through files your team imports. Either works. What matters is that someone checks each translated page on the live storefront, not just in the file.
Plan for new products. A catalogue keeps growing. Agree a turnaround and a price for each new batch of products, and decide who tells the translator a batch is ready, or the second language falls behind within a season.
Question one per-word rate for everything. A spec table and a campaign headline aren’t the same job. A quote that prices them identically often means machine output with a light edit across the board, sold as human translation.
Shopify covers some of its own text; the rest is yours. Checkout arrives translated in Shopify’s supported languages, and free Shopify themes include translated default text; check both for your languages and theme. A translator handles what you wrote:
- Product titles, descriptions and the metafields behind specs and sizing
- Collection copy and navigation labels
- Policies and notification emails
- Image alt text
Match the method to the content. Machine translation with a human edit suits specs, care instructions and the long tail of products that sell a few units a month. Headlines, ads, subject lines and anything meant to persuade need transcreation from a native copywriter.
Write the glossary before the first word. Keep one glossary and style sheet per language: brand terms that stay in English, product names, formal or informal address, units. Without one, three translators produce three versions of the same button.
Search terms don’t translate. Shoppers in each market search in their own words, and those aren’t always the dictionary version of your English keyword. Ask the translator to check the terms locals use before product titles and collection names are fixed.
Let Markets own the URLs. Shopify Markets creates the language URLs and hreflang tags, so the translator only owns the words. If that setup isn’t done yet, get it scoped first.
Translation is priced by the word and transcreation by the hour, because a tagline can take longer than a spec sheet. Typical market ranges:
Human translation
Per word, most language pairs
Transcreation
Per hour, slogans, ads and campaign copy
Markets setup (separate service)
Languages, domains, pricing on Shopify
Rates vary by language pair. The total turns on word count across products, collections, policies and emails, how much of it can go through machine translation with a human edit, and whether the translator also reviews each page in the live store.
The third tile is there for budgeting only. Markets, languages and domains are configured by setup specialists, not translators, and it pays to have that work scoped before translation starts.
A product CSV export gives a translator a fair word count to price from; add your policies and any emails you’ve rewritten.
Scope the work by content type, since each one needs a different method and level of review:
Titles, descriptions, filters and the metafields behind them
Returns, shipping and privacy, plus the emails customers receive
Taglines, ads and subject lines rewritten for native readers
Brand terms, tone and formal or informal address per language
Product titles and collection names in the words each market uses
Every translated page checked in place, including on mobile
Short strings and tight spaces. Store copy is full of button labels, filter names, variant options and SEO titles with length limits, and a translation that reads well in a document can overflow a mobile menu. An ecommerce specialist also keeps variant names consistent across hundreds of products, so a filter for one colour doesn’t split into three spellings.
Usually, and this is where transcreation earns its hourly rate. Ad platforms impose character limits that a direct translation rarely fits, and subject lines depend on idiom. Expect the translator to offer options rather than one version, and to ask what the original was meant to achieve. Send campaigns with enough lead time for a native review before they go out.
The details a local shopper expects to see in their own format: units and measurements written into descriptions, date formats in delivery promises, sizing references, and images with text baked into them. Seasonal references need checking too, since a summer sale lands in winter south of the equator. Currency settings, domains and which products each market sees are part of Markets setup, not translation.
Ask a native-speaking customer, stockist or member of staff to read your top pages and flag anything that sounds foreign. For a second opinion, pay another translator to review a sample rather than the whole store. Back-translation, where a second person translates the text back into English, catches meaning errors but not awkward phrasing, so use it for policies and specs rather than marketing copy.
Yes. Returns, shipping and privacy policies set out what you’ve promised customers, and a mistranslated refund window becomes a customer service problem in that language. Have a professional translate them, then ask someone familiar with consumer rules in that market to review the result. A translator isn’t a legal adviser, and a good one will say so.
No, but anything a shopper can reach should read properly. Fields left untranslated appear in your store’s original language, so a half-finished catalogue produces pages that switch language mid-scroll. Start with best-sellers, collections, navigation and policies, then work through the long tail in batches, or keep slow-moving products out of that market until they’re done.
