How do I make a multilingual site in Website Builder?

In this guide, we show how you can make your Website Builder site multilingual. As an example, we are adding a Danish version to an English site.

After following this guide, the overall structure of your website is in place, and you can start adding the translated content to the new pages.

Step 1 - Make all pages subpages of your main home page

Start by turning all pages into subpages of your main home page; see the screenshot for how it should look. Check our guide if you need more information on how to do this: How do I add a subpage?

wsb_multilanguage1.png

Step 2 - Rename your home page

Next, you need to rename your home page to the language it represents. What you enter here will become the text your visitors click to change to this language. In this example, we've used "EN" to indicate English, but you can call it whatever you want.

  1. Open the pages menu.
  2. Right-click on your home page and select Settings.
  3. Change the page name in the menu to "EN", another language, or another name you prefer.
  4. Change the folder name to "en" as well, in lowercase. Make sure there are no special characters or spaces here, as the URL title is sensitive to this.
  5. Click Save.

wsb_multilanguage2.png

Step 3 - Duplicate pages for the additional language

Make a duplicate of each page for the other language. A duplicate page is a copy of the original page, making it easy to add the translated text.

  1. Open the pages menu.
  2. Right-click on the first page and click Duplicate page.
  3. Enter a name for the page - the translated version of the original page - and click OK.
  4. Repeat this until you have a duplicate of each page.
  5. Turn the pages into subpages of the home page of the new language; see the screenshot for how it should look.

wsb_multilanguage3.png

Step 4 - Add links to the home page of each language

To make the home page visible in the menu with the other pages, you need to create a link to each home page in the menu.

  1. Open the pages menu.
  2. Click the button to add a link to the menu. It's the white/blue one with a chain.
  3. Click Link in the menu to the left.
  4. Click the button Link to file or page in the top-right corner.
  5. Select the (front) page you want to link to and click Save.
  6. Type the name for your home page that should be visible in the menu under Link title.
  7. Click Add to save your settings.
  8. Make the link a subpage of the actual home page you are linking to; see the screenshot.
  9. Repeat this for each language.

wsb_multilanguage4.png

Step 5 - Change the start level for your menu

The next step is to fix the menu. Due to the changes you just made, your menu only shows the language pages.

  1. Select the menu component on your page.
  2. Click Edit menu, which appears above or below the menu component.
  3. In the settings that appear, change the start level to Pages on second level.
  4. Click Style to adjust the styling of the menu. You can always choose between two styles for the main menu and submenu, respectively. You can edit each style by clicking the gear icon. 

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Step 6 - Add a new menu as a language selector

Finally, you should add a new menu to your website template that allows visitors to change the language.

  1. Click More in the menu to the left.
  2. Go to Navigation and choose a horizontal menu.
  3. Drag the menu to your page and place it in the header at the top. This way, the menu will be visible on all pages using this template.
  4. Click Edit menu, which appears above or below the menu component. 
  5. Change the menu type to horizontal single level.
  6. In the pop-up menu, click Style if you want to change the styling of this menu (optional).
  7. Adjust the size and placement of the menu to your liking and click Save.
Note: The changes that you make to both menus will only be consistent across pages that use the same template. If you have a different template on one page, the menus might look different (for example, they might be vertical instead of horizontal). We recommend using the same template across pages as this will make it easier to navigate the site when it has more than one language option.

wsb_multilanguage7.png

Step 7 - Add the translated text and publish your site

The structure of your site is now done. So you can start adding the translated text and other content. Click Preview if you want to see how your site will look.

Once you have added the translated content, you can publish your site to make it visible online.

Note: The menu links to your home pages that you added, don't work in preview mode. They will work once you site has been published.

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