LingoPressDocs

Getting started

Requirements

  • WordPress 6.5 or higher.
  • PHP 8.1 or higher. (These are requirements your hosting needs to meet. If you’re not sure which version you have, your hosting provider can confirm it for you.)
  • To translate with AI, you’ll need an API key from at least one provider (a key you copy from the AI provider’s website: Anthropic, Google, OpenAI, or Groq). The multilingual side works completely without any key; the AI is an optional extra.

Installation

  1. Install the plugin from your WordPress dashboard (Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin) and activate it.
  2. The LingoPress menu will appear in your admin dashboard, organized into tabs: Getting started (a getting-started guide that opens when you go in), Languages, AI translation, Content & sync, String translations (your site’s standalone bits of text), Queue (the job queue), and License (license and updates).

Creating your languages

Go to LingoPress → Languages and add your languages. For each one you fill in its name, its slug (the short text that will appear in the web address, for example es or en), its locale (the language code, such as es_ES or en_US), its flag, and the order you want them shown in.

The first language you create becomes the default language; you can change that later.

When you create or delete languages, your site’s web addresses (URLs) reorganize themselves: you don’t have to adjust anything by hand. From that point on, every page carries its language in the address, for example /es/mi-entrada/ and /en/my-post/.

Assigning a language to content you already had

Everything you create after installing the plugin automatically gets the default language. For content that already existed beforehand, you choose its language in one of two ways:

  • From the Language box you’ll see inside the editor of each post or page.
  • From the quick selector that appears in your post lists.

Creating a translation

You have three routes:

  1. With AI (the easiest): in your post list, each language column shows you how that translation is doing. ● is the post’s own language, ✓ means the translation already exists and you can edit it, and + means it doesn’t exist yet and you can create it. When you create it, you can choose ✦ AI translate: the AI translates the title, the content, and the excerpt, and saves the result as a draft already linked to the original, ready for you to review before publishing.
  2. Several at once: select several posts and use the bulk action Translate to … (AI). The translations are prepared in the background while you keep working; you can watch their progress in LingoPress → Queue.
  3. By hand: the + also lets you create the translation as a copy of the original so you can translate it yourself. The editor box takes care of keeping the different versions linked to each other.

Setting up the AI (optional, 5 minutes)

In LingoPress → AI translation:

  1. Choose the provider and paste its API key (the key you copy from the provider’s website). If you prefer a more technical option, you can also set it in the WordPress configuration file; we explain that in AI translation.
  2. Write the Site context: one or two sentences that tell the AI what your site is about and which words can have more than one meaning. This is what improves translation quality the most, because it’s the instructions the AI receives so it doesn’t get confused.
  3. If you like, add Glossary rules: terms that should always be translated a particular way, or that should never be translated (for example, your brand name).

Coming from Polylang?

You don’t have to redo anything: the built-in importer brings over your languages, the language of each piece of content, and the links between translations, all exactly as they were.

Keeping the plugin up to date (optional)

LingoPress works completely without a license. If you have a license key, enter it in the License tab: with an active license, your site receives new versions like any other WordPress update (you’ll see the notice in Dashboard → Updates and you update with one click). Without a license, the plugin keeps working just the same, but it doesn’t receive automatic updates.