Translations
How Kobold translates your theme and store content into the languages you've added in Shopify.
Kobold translates your store into the languages you have already added in Shopify (published or not). Adding or removing a language stays in Shopify under Settings › Languages.
What Kobold translates
| Area | What | How it reaches your store |
|---|---|---|
| Theme text | Buttons, labels and cart text from your theme's language files | Written to Kobold's copy of your theme and published with it |
| Theme content | Text you typed into sections and theme settings | Added to the copy and published with it |
| Store content | Products, collections, pages, blog posts, menus and image alt text | Added when you approve and publish, after you've reviewed every translation |
Kobold never translates URL handles (unless you ask), tags, checkout and email notifications, payment and delivery names, or market-specific translations. Shop policies are translated only when you ask for them, and you approve each one separately.
Existing translations are kept. Kobold fills missing translations and the ones Shopify marks as out of date. It replaces existing translations only when you explicitly ask ("replace the French translations of the cart"). Translations made by you or another app, like Translate & Adapt, count as existing.
The Translations page
Open a store and press Translations in the page header (or go to Stores › your store › Translations). The page shows:
- Languages: one card per language you've added in Shopify, with how much is translated overall and per area (theme text, theme content, store content), and how many strings are missing (red) or out of date (amber). A language that's being translated says what Kobold is doing right now ("Reading your store's text", "Translating into German · 312 / 1,104", "Checking the translations") and links to its task. When it's your turn, the card turns amber with Waiting on you and a Review sample or Review button. Manage languages in Shopify opens Shopify's language settings.
- Runs: past translation tasks with their languages, areas, how many translations went live, who started them and their status. Undo is there for 30 days after a run goes live.
- Glossary: brand and product names Kobold keeps as is ("Oak & Ember") and words it always translates the same way ("cutting board" → "Schneidebrett"). Owners and developers can add, edit and delete terms; Kobold suggests terms from your store memory, and you add or dismiss them. A translation that breaks the glossary can't be approved until it's fixed. Your store's Memory page links here.
Kobold re-reads your languages when the page is more than an hour old, and Sync now does it right away.
Starting a translation
From the Translations page, press Translate missing on a language. Pick the areas (shop policies are never included; ask for them in a task), choose whether to include out-of-date translations, and check the estimate: the number of strings, the credits and about how long it takes. Start translating opens the task with the plan already approved, and Nib starts on the sample. If you don't have enough credits, Buy credits shows instead.
You can also ask in a task, for example "Translate the store into German" or "Translate the cart into French". Pip posts a translation plan with the languages, what it will translate, how, and a credit estimate. Press Translate it to start, or Adjust plan to change it.
While it runs, the task always shows what's happening: Nib reads your store's text, drafts the sample, then translates the rest with a live count ("Translating into German · 312 / 1,104"), puts the theme text on the copy, and Moss checks the result. Each check shows as soon as it finishes; if one finds something, such as text that doesn't fit on the page, Moss's card reads Needs a look and the rows it points at are marked in the review. Each language's card shows its progress (sample, drafting, checks). When the sample or the review is ready, the task's status reads Sample ready for review or Waiting for your approval. You can leave the page; the Translations page shows the same progress. Cancel run stops it; nothing goes live, and credits already used aren't refunded.
If something stops a translation, the task says why and what to do, and shows Needs your help. For example, Shopify allows 20 themes: when your theme library is full, Kobold can't make the copy that theme translations go on, so delete a theme you don't use in Shopify, or translate store content only. If Shopify won't let Kobold read part of your store's text, the task names what it left out, and the rest is translated.
Sample first
Before translating everything, Nib translates 10 strings per language, all listed in the task. Approve, edit or reject each one, or press Approve all (a note helps: "use Warenkorb, not Einkaufswagen"); your choices guide the rest. You can redraft rejected strings twice. A sample left unanswered for 7 days stops the translation (you get a reminder on day 6).
Checks
Moss checks every translation: placeholders, links and numbers unchanged, HTML intact, plural forms complete, your glossary followed, and how the text fits on the page in each language. See QA checks.
Review and publish
When Moss has checked the translations, the review panel opens by itself on a computer (once; it never covers a panel you opened), and Moss's message has a Review translations button that opens it again (on a phone, the review sheet). You can also open Translations in the task's review panel. It shows each string's original, the current translation (if any, marked Outdated when Shopify says so) and Kobold's draft. Filter by language, area, type and status (Needs a look, approved, rejected, edited) or search. Approve or reject a row, tick several and use Approve selected / Reject selected, or Approve all: that approves every row without a warning, and a second press approves the rows with warnings too, after a confirm. Rows that break the glossary or a placeholder can't be approved until you edit them. Owners and developers can edit a draft in place; approvers decide only.
If someone else decides a row at the same time, you see their decision. The footer counts the rows (approved, need a look, rejected) and how many are still to decide. Once every string is decided, Approve & publish (or Approve & apply translations when only store content was translated) shows a summary and adds the approved translations. If someone changes a translation in Shopify after Kobold drafted it, Kobold leaves theirs in place and lists it as skipped; Translate skipped in the result card drafts those again.
Theme text and theme content are added to Kobold's copy of your theme, so you can check them in the preview before anything goes live. If Shopify doesn't keep theme content translations on an unpublished copy, Kobold publishes the copy first and then adds the theme content to it, now your live theme; the task says so, and rolling back the theme removes them.
Don't edit theme translations in Shopify while a task waits for approval. Kobold's copy carries your live theme's translations as they were when it was made. Kobold doesn't yet detect theme translation edits made in Shopify (or by Translate & Adapt) after that, so publishing the copy would replace them. Store content isn't affected: those edits are always kept.
Apply to live theme
When a translation only changes translations (no other theme files), you don't need to publish Kobold's copy of your theme. In the review, Apply to live theme is the main button: Kobold writes only the translations you approved into your live theme (its language file and its section and settings text) and leaves everything else as it is. Publish the copy instead publishes the copy as usual. If the copy changes anything besides translations, only Publish the copy is offered and the review says why.
Moss's "ready for your review" message names the button you'll use: Apply to live theme, Publish the copy when only the copy can go live, or Approve & apply translations when only store content was translated.
The confirm lists what changes, per area: Theme text (every theme string, wherever Shopify keeps it), Theme content (section and settings text) and Store content. Kobold first saves exactly what your live theme had, skips any translation someone changed since you reviewed it ("Changed since review"), then deletes the copy so it doesn't take one of Shopify's 20 theme slots. The live theme is named by its title in Shopify (for example "kobold-0007"), and the name follows every publish, rollback or theme you publish in Shopify. A card at the end of the task shows the progress (one count from start to end), then Applied with the number of translations actually written, the ones skipped as changed since review and any Shopify refused listed apart, with Undo and, when translations were skipped as changed since review, Translate again; Moss runs the smoke tests on your live store in the new language. If they fail, Undo is the first button. Only owners and approvers can apply translations to the live theme, as with publishing. On the canvas, the Done review offers the same choice for sessions that only translate.
Undo
For 30 days you can undo a translation run. If it was applied to your live theme, Undo puts the language file back exactly as it was (or, if someone edited it since, puts back only Kobold's keys) and restores the section and settings text. Kobold puts back the translations you had before, except ones changed since (those are left as they are). Theme text comes back through the theme rollback.
Credits
Translation is billed per run like other work: the plan shows an estimate, and you pay for what was actually used. See Credits.
On the canvas
When the store has more than one language, the canvas top bar shows a language switcher. Pick a language and every frame shows that language (/fr/…); prompts then edit that language, and the prompt bar says so ("Edits French"). If translation access isn't approved yet, a translation prompt shows a note with Approve in Shopify instead of sending, and no credits are used.
Permissions
Translations need three Shopify permissions (read_translations, write_translations, read_locales). Stores connected earlier show an Approve translation access banner on the store page and on the Translations page until a workspace owner approves them (Not now hides the banner for 14 days). Developers see the banner but ask an owner to approve. Translations you added stay in Shopify if you remove Kobold.