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Adding languages to your store and different Shopify Market settings

How to add languages to your store and map them to your Shopify Markets

Todor avatar
Written by Todor
Updated over 3 months ago

To make the languages you add with our app available in your store, you have to add them to your market. There are two scenarios:


Add a language to your store

To add a language to your store, go to the Languages page in T Lab and click on Add language:

Then, select the desired language and click Add language:

Note, that you are not able to add the language that you use as your Primary language for the store

Now that the language is added to your store, you can already start translating your resources.

However, to make sure the language is active on the website, you first have to publish it:

And then, you need to publish it in your Shopify Markets settings


Publish your languages in Shopify Markets and different Shopify market setups (single market, subfolders, domain/subdomain)


If you are using a single market

1. With a single market setup, navigate to Shopify Admin -> Markets and open the desired market.


2. There, click on the "+" next to languages.


3. Select the domain you would like to assign it to and save.


That's it! Your language should now be visible on your store, and you can proceed with an AI Translation

Don't forget that the language should be Published in our app as well before its URL can be accessed


If you are using multiple markets (subfolder setup)

With the subfolder setup in your Shopify Markets, you can select different languages as primary for the market. This is best if you would like to use the Shopify Country/Region redirection setting.

To create a subfolder setup for a market and have a different language than the primary one on the store as the default, here is what you would need to do.

1. Navigate to Markets and open the market you would like this setup on.


2. Click on the "+" next to the "Languages"


3. Click on "New Subfolder".


4. There you can add the languages that you would like to have on this market by clicking on "Add languages"


When you add the language, you can click on "Done", or IF you would like to make it the primary language of the market, click on the three dots next to the language and select "Set as default".

Setting a specific language as the default for the Shopify Market will not change the primary language of the entire store.


If you are using multiple markets (Domain/Subdomain Setup)

1. Navigate to Markets and open the market you would like this setup on.


2. Click on the "+" next to the "Languages"


3. Select the domain or subdomain you've added.


4. This is it when it comes to the market setup, this domain is not linked to this domain.


Adding languages to the domain/subdomain setup


To add multiple languages in the domain/subdomain, click on the drop down of the domain once it has been published in a market and click on the "+".

This will take you to the Languages option in Shopify. Simply click on the three dots next to the language you would like to assign to the domain and select "Assign to domain."


Select the domain you would like to assign the language to.


Changing the default language of a domain/subdomain


If you would like to assign a different language than the primary one of your store as the default language for a specific domain, select "Set as domain default"


And select the domain you would like the language to be the default of.


This is it, the default language of your domain/subdomain should be changed.


Geolocation

Shopify provides a built-in Market-based redirection feature that automatically sends visitors to the correct regional version of your store based on their location.

You can enable this feature from your Shopify admin by navigating to:

Online Store → Preferences

To ensure that the redirection works smoothly as a Geolocation tool, follow these steps:

  • Set up multiple Markets in your Shopify admin — for example, one for Spain, France, and Germany.

  • Assign a default language to each Market that matches the country’s primary language.

  • When a customer visits your store from a specific country (for example, Spain), Shopify will automatically redirect them to your Spanish Market.

If Spanish is set as the default language for that Market, your store will display in Spanish by default. Visitors will still have the option to switch to another available language if you’ve added more.

This setup ensures a seamless localized shopping experience for your customers and works perfectly alongside Translation Lab’s native multilingual support.

Shopify fully manages both Market redirection and Market configurations (including domains, subfolders, and currency settings).
Translation Lab integrates natively with Shopify Markets and automatically follows their setup, but it has no control over Market behavior, redirection logic, or how Shopify handles Market settings.

Translation Lab does not support market-specific translations

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