What is multilingual UX and how to improve it in 6 steps

When websites offer a multilingual user experience (UX), users can easily navigate, interact with and understand their content – regardless of the user’s language or location.

For example, users can:

• Read the website in their preferred language.
• View prices in their local currency.
• Use payment methods available in their region.

Making your website’s UX multilingual can take quite a bit of work. This is especially true if you have many language users to cater to, or if your website is packed with content and features.

But is the effort worth it?

The answer is yes. In this guide, you’ll learn why, plus how to improve your website’s multilingual UX.

Benefits of multilingual UX

The benefits of providing good multilingual UX include:

More search traffic

Search engines want to serve relevant results to users. This includes results in users’ preferred languages.

Make your content available in these languages, and it’ll stand a greater chance of being ranked higher on – and getting more clicks from – the search engine results pages.

Reducing user drop-offs

Drop-offs happen when users leave your site without completing the action you want them to take (like making a purchase).

This can happen if they encounter something on your website that isn’t customary in their region. Having to enter information in a foreign language is one example.

Providing good multilingual UX minimises these issues, helping users convert more easily.

Foster trust with users

Imagine there are two sites that are identical in every way, except for the language they’re in. One displays text in the visitor’s native language, while the other displays text in a language foreign to them.

Most people might instinctively prefer using the first site. As Fraser Dunk, CEO of customer experience consultancy Jurnii, explains:

“People prefer to browse, purchase and use websites that speak to them locally. They’re more likely to buy from a platform and experience they trust. A localised UX plays a huge part in fostering that trust.”

Increased conversions

When you have more site visitors who trust your brand and can interact with your site easily, increased conversions may follow.

Likewise, when you personalise your content. This makes users more likely to buy, as shared by 75% of consumers who responded to Deloitte Digital’s Marketing Trends of 2025 survey.

So, think more signups and sales, as users enjoy a tailored site experience and convert with less fuss.

How to provide good multilingual UX

Here’s a six-step process for providing good multilingual UX on any website:

1. Adapt all aspects of the user journey

There are at least two approaches to improving a website’s multilingual UX.

• Adapt all of your website’s pages.
• Adapt your website’s user journeys.

Both approaches appear to have the same outcome: a website adapted for local users. But the user journey-centric approach is more effective.

The page-centric approach may lead to you adapting all webpages, regardless of importance, “just because they’re there”. In contrast, the user journey-centric approach emphasises adapting the key pages that users navigate to progress towards an end goal.

It also draws your attention to non-content elements on the page that need adapting, like payment methods, to help users complete the goal.

For a global gaming brand that engaged Jurnii to enhance its website’s usability for Brazilian users, this meant supporting the Boleto payment method, for example.

Jurnii also recommended providing customer service via WhatsApp.

2. Localise your content

Localisation means adapting something for the local context, and it’s a big part of fostering multilingual UX.

If you’re localising text, you’ll typically translate the source content into your audience’s language. Then, you’ll refine the translations to match how your audience would actually say or write them.

“For example, phrases that work well in English can sound too complex when directly translated into Nordic languages,” shares Ninni Kotz, Web Manager at Semantix.

“This is where localisation is important for adapting ideas for the users of the target language, while ensuring the wording used to express them remains clear.”

Sometimes, this can mean rewriting text to incorporate local dialects or slang. But even tweaks to smaller details, like these below, can go a long way:

• Date formats – for example, Brits usually write the day before the month, while Americans do the opposite.
• Currencies – so that users don’t need to convert prices to local currencies themselves.
• Units of measurement – think distance, weight, temperature, and more.

Separately, localise your website’s images and multimedia.

Some assets may just need the text in them translated. In contrast, you may need to overhaul others to depict something entirely different.

3. Create mirrored website layouts for right-to-left languages

Most languages run from left to right. But some languages, like Arabic and Hebrew, are written and read from right to left.

Displaying right-to-left (RTL) language content on website layouts that cater to left-to-right (LTR) languages would make the content look out of place. Possibly even difficult to navigate.

The solution?

Work with your web designers to create mirrored website layouts for RTL languages.

Think of it as holding a mirror beside a layout for an LTR language. The layout would appear horizontally flipped, with its elements starting from the opposite direction. This is a good starting point for creating the layout’s RTL counterpart.

To be more specific, your mirrored layout should account for matters like:

• Right-aligning text instead of left-aligning it.
• Mirroring the appearance of icons that have directionality elements, like arrows.
• Changing the direction of text input, such as having form fields fill up with text from right to left.

4. Preview your localised content in context

After creating your localised content, preview it in context.

In other words, add your content to the places it’ll appear on your website, matching its final formatting as much as possible.

This is especially important if your content needs to fit within a defined space on the page. When you preview the content in context, you’ll have a good idea of how it’ll look on the live version of your website.

Then, if its appearance looks off, you can adjust it before users see it.

One example of content that we recommend previewing in context is button text.

Buttons should usually appear short and snappy. But button copy can lengthen when translated. For instance, “log in” can become “se connecter” in French.

That’s a 50% increase in characters that, depending on your website layout, could make your button too long and visually unappealing.

One solution is to adjust your layout to accommodate the longer button. Alternatively, using different button copy may be more appropriate.

When you work with us, you’ll have the option of using our GlobalLink Web tool. It displays translations in context within a staging environment, with no manual copy-pasting of content needed.

With GlobalLink Web, you’ll not only have an easier time reviewing how the translations will fit into the overall UX, but can also focus on refining their quality.

5. Direct users to the correct regional version of your website

If users visit your website, only to find it’s in a language they don’t understand, they might leave. And there goes your chance to nurture and convert them.

To help prevent this from happening, work with your developers to have your website show content in users’ regions – and language – when they land on it.

For example, your website could:

• Detect the user’s browser region and language settings, and then redirect them to the appropriate version of your website.
• Let users switch to a different regional and language version of your store if they prefer.

This is exactly what the website for Swedish outdoor outdoor brand Fjällräven does.

Try visiting “fjallraven.com” and watch the URL change in your browser’s address bar as you’re redirected to the appropriate website for your region.

There’s also an option to manually visit a different country’s store.

Also, request your search engine optimisation (SEO) team to implement hreflang tags.

These are HTML tags that help search engines rank the appropriate regional and language version of your website to match users’ corresponding preferences.

This way, when searchers click your website on the search results, they’ll see content tailored to their local context automatically.

6. Test your website’s multilingual UX

Recruit local testers to provide feedback on your website’s multilingual UX before you roll out your changes.

Try to get testers who represent your target audience. Their experience navigating your website may more likely mirror what potential customers will experience, making their feedback more valuable.

Then, have your testers click through common user journeys and assess how easily they could complete them.

Ask them questions like:

• How easily could you understand the website’s text? (You can even quiz them on their understanding of crucial portions of text.)
• How was the checkout experience?
• Did you spot issues with the website’s content? If yes, share more details on these issues and the pages on which you discovered them.

Collate their feedback, and then use it to improve your website.

Start improving your multilingual UX

Offering a good multilingual UX on your website is key to engaging visitors from various regional markets. This, in turn, is the first step to converting them into customers.

As mentioned, however, improving a website’s multilingual UX can be an intensive process. Focusing on localising core user journeys can make the work more manageable.

Working with competent translation partners can also help.

Semantix is a trusted provider of high-quality text translations for multilingual websites. Our expert localisation teams handle thousands of projects daily. And they’re ready to help with yours, too.