Developers around the world tend to use English when they develop plugins. But, if you want to use another language, then that is not a simple matter. For those cases, you need to translate WordPress plugin to the language you wish to. To be specific, you need to translate plugin strings. The good news is, WordPress is very flexible in these matters. Not only it gives you the open-source style but also a limitless possibility. You can do anything you want.

Today, we are going to show you the methods to translate WordPress plugins quickly and effectively. Be sure to read the whole process carefully. Because, if you miss a step, you will lose the flow and have to do it all over again. This blog is sponsored by RootenTheme, a partner product of Element Pack.

Getting ready- Plugins that you can translate

Before the translation process, you need to make sure the targeted plugin is ready for translation. In short, the strings of the plugin code have a GNU gettext framework and are localized.

To have deeper insight on GNU gettext framework, see this article.

However, you can find if the plugin is ready or not by its POT file inside Local files/plugin-name/languages. Now, remember, you have to look into the local or source file of the plugin. In case you don’t see the POT file there, no worries. You can easily create one to translate the WordPress plugin.

You can create POT file for the plugins with Easy Po. Just make sure to follow their guidelines carefully.

Now that you have your POT file for the target plugin is ready let’s get to the main process. Note that you can pick any methods from those stated below.

Translate plugin using POEdit

First, install POEdit software (you can use the free version). To make the file translation ready, you need to turn the POT file into language.po (portable object) and convert this into language.mo (machine object) files.

Now, remember that every language has a code name for it. So, you have to save the language.mo file according to the language codes. (i.e: bn_BD.mo, en_AU.mo, etc.)

Now, follow the steps to translate WordPress plugin easily.