When I started building this WordPress blog, I thought it would be interesting if I could also create English pages.
Creating separate English pages manually sounded troublesome, so I decided to use a multilingual plugin.
The plugin I am currently using is TranslatePress.
Why I Chose TranslatePress
To be honest, I did not compare many plugins in great detail at first.
However, a few things about TranslatePress felt right for me.
- there is a free version
- you can translate while viewing the actual page
- it looked relatively simple
Those points made it seem like a good fit for me.
In particular, being able to translate while looking at the real page was very easy to understand.
Compared to plugins where you search for text only inside the admin panel, this felt much easier to use.
I Write Articles in Japanese First
I first write articles in Japanese, and then I add the English version afterward.
After enabling TranslatePress, a menu item called "Translate Page" appears at the top of WordPress.
Clicking "Translate Page" on the page you want to translate opens the translation screen.
The screen layout is very simple.
- Left side: translation input area
- Right side: live page preview
That is basically how the interface is organized.
When you click a sentence on the page preview, the corresponding text appears on the left side, where you can enter the English translation.
It felt slightly confusing at first, but working while viewing the real page turned out to be easier than I expected.
I Do Not Rely Completely on Automatic Translation
The English pages are mainly based on browser-generated translations.
However, some parts sound unnatural as-is, so I manually fix only the sections that bother me.
For example:
- pronouns
- awkward phrasing
things like that.
If I tried to perfect everything, it would never end, so I work with the mindset that “good enough to understand” is fine.
There Is More Manual Work Than I Expected
At first, I expected the process to be much more automated.
In reality, however, there is still quite a lot of manual work involved.
For example:
- entering translations one by one
- checking for untranslated text
- adjusting wording
- checking the layout
and similar tasks.
In particular, some Cocoon-related text and interface elements were not translated automatically.
Things That Confused Me a Little
Browser tab titles
Even on English pages, the browser tab titles remained in Japanese.
It seems that TranslatePress alone cannot change browser tab titles.
For now, I am leaving this issue as it is.
JP｜EN Switch
I also struggled a little with the language switch design at first.
I tried using a floating language switch button, but on iPhones it overlapped with the bottom menus of Safari and Firefox, making it difficult to tap.
In the end, I changed it to a simple 'JP | EN' in the header menu.
What I Liked About Creating English Pages
The number of visitors is still quite small.
However, it is interesting to see searches and overseas visitors that I would never reach with Japanese pages alone.
Also, reviewing the English pages sometimes makes me realize that parts of my original Japanese explanations were surprisingly vague.
My Current Thoughts
At the moment, I feel that TranslatePress is very suitable for people who simply want to try making their personal blog multilingual.
“I just want to make my personal blog multilingual for now.”
That kind of casual use case seems to fit TranslatePress very well.
Running a fully professional multilingual site probably comes with completely different challenges.
But for now, I find it more than easy enough to use.
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