In this article, you'll learn about Lokalise Flow project languages and how to manage them.
Languages types
Lokalise Flow project have two languages types: base and target. These languages are chosen when performing initial project setup:
Base language
This is the primary language of your store, the one you'll translate from.
The base language is determined by your Shopify settings and can't be changed on Lokalise Flow. To view your base language, go to your Shopify store, then navigate to Settings > Languages > Published languages.
In this example, English is set as the default, so it will serve as the base language on Lokalise Flow. If you need to change the default language, click Change default in Shopify, but note that this action requires reinstalling Lokalise Flow.
For more details on changing the base language, refer to the instructions in the FAQ.
Target languages and existing translations backup
These are the languages you'll translate into, matching those supported by Shopify. In the beta version, you can select up to two languages. If you need more, contact us via the chat in the bottom-right corner.
When you publish translations from Lokalise Flow to Shopify, your existing translations in the target languages will be overwritten. For instance, if you choose Spanish as a target language, any existing Spanish translations in your store will be replaced.
To save a copy of your current translations, go to your store settings, proceed to Languages, and click Export.
Adjust the export options and your translations will be sent to your email.
Don’t worry, translations on Lokalise Flow won't be published automatically. You can decide which ones to publish later.
Managing languages
During the preview stage, you can add up to two languages on Lokalise Flow by default. If you need to add more languages, please contact us.
Adding languages on Lokalise Flow
To add more languages to your Lokalise Flow project:
Open the project and click Translate a new language in the Content manager:
Choose a language from the dropdown, and then click Start translations:
Adding languages on Shopify
You can also add languages directly on Shopify:
Open your Shopify Admin and click Settings:
Proceed to Languages:
Click Add language:
Choose the target language from the dropdown:
Click Add.
Please don’t forget to assign your new language to a market as explained in the Assigning languages section.
Assigning languages to the store and previewing content
To preview your translated content, follow these steps:
Open your store on Shopify and navigate to the admin page.
Select an active market to add your language to by opening Settings:
Click Markets:
Choose your market:
Click Languages and domains:
Add your target language to the selected market:
Once you’ve added the language, you can click Preview to view different language versions of your online store:
You can preview both published and unpublished languages.