Sawir Live Translate
Open any page on your site, click “Translate this page” in the admin bar, choose a target language, and either auto-translate every visible string (via a free machine-translation service) or edit translations by hand while seeing the page update live.
Saved translations are rendered server-side into the HTML response (SEO-friendly: no flash of untranslated text, and hreflang alternates in the head), and visitors switch languages via a link-based switcher (bottom-right).
Developed by Ricardo Sawir for Sawir Studio LLC.
- Website: https://sawirstudio.com
- X: https://x.com/RicardoSawir
- GitHub: https://github.com/sawirricardo
- Email: ricardo@sawirstudio.com
URLs use a language path prefix, e.g. /es/about for Spanish, /about for the source language (which stays canonical, un-prefixed). Language is resolved in this order: /es/ path → ?lang=es → saved cookie → browser Accept-Language → source. Root and prefix-less URLs auto-detect the visitor’s browser language without redirecting (a Vary header is sent so shared caches behave).
- Settings → Live Translate: set your source language and tick the languages to offer.
- Visit a front-end page and click “🌐 Translate this page” in the admin bar.
- Pick a language, hit “Auto-translate empty” (or edit strings), then “Save”.
- Visitors use the switcher (bottom-right); each language has its own /xx/ URL.
Note: language path prefixes assume a root-domain install and no top-level page whose slug is a two-letter language code.
External services
This plugin’s optional “Auto-translate” feature (admin-only, triggered manually by clicking an Auto-translate/Translate button) sends the source text strings and the chosen language pair to the MyMemory translation API (https://mymemory.translated.net/) to fetch machine translations. The request is made from the administrator’s browser only when they click the button; no visitor data is ever sent, and nothing is sent automatically.
- Service terms: https://mymemory.translated.net/doc/en/tos.php
- Privacy policy: https://mymemory.translated.net/doc/en/privacy.php
Developers can swap the provider — see “Custom translation provider” below.
Native WordPress localization (dates, core/theme strings)
On a translated request the plugin switches WordPress’s locale to the target language, so dates (month/day names) and any installed core, theme, and plugin translations render natively — the string map only covers the rest.
For this to have visible effect the language pack must be installed. The easiest way is Settings → General → Site Language: pick and save the language once (which downloads its pack), then switch back to your source language. Languages without an installed pack still work for content translation; only native dates/strings are skipped. Map codes to custom WP locales with the ‘sawir_lt_wp_locale’ filter.
Scan site for strings
Settings → Live Translate → “Scan site now” crawls your published pages, posts, and public archives to discover every translatable string up front (batched, with a progress indicator). Discovered strings then appear in the “Edit all site strings” section right below, where you can pick a language and translate, auto- translate, or bulk-import the whole site at once instead of page by page. Note: machine translation is still rate-limited by the free service, so for large sites use Bulk edit to export and translate elsewhere.
Multisite
Multisite-aware. Each subsite has its own settings and its own translations table, configured independently. Tables are created on network activation, when a new subsite is created, and lazily on first admin visit; uninstall cleans every site on the network.
Custom switcher
Turn off “Built-in switcher” in settings and render your own anywhere in your theme using sawir_lt_switcher_links(), which returns the language links for the current page:
<?php if ( function_exists( 'sawir_lt_switcher_links' ) ) : ?>
<ul class="my-lang-switcher">
<?php foreach ( sawir_lt_switcher_links() as $l ) : ?>
<li>
<a href="<?php echo esc_url( $l['url'] ); ?>"<?php echo $l['active'] ? ' aria-current="true"' : ''; ?>>
<?php echo esc_html( $l['name'] ); ?>
</a>
</li>
<?php endforeach; ?>
</ul>
<?php endif; ?>
Each item is [‘code’,’name’,’url’,’active’,’is_source’] (code is ” for the source language). sawir_lt_current_lang() returns the active language code.
Custom translation provider
Auto-translate uses the free MyMemory API by default. To use your own provider (DeepL, Google, a local model, …), reassign window.SawirLT.translate from a script enqueued after the ‘sawir-lt-walk’ handle. Signature: it receives the source text and the two language codes, and returns a Promise resolving to the translated string. Every auto-translate path (in-page editor and admin bulk translate) routes through it.
add_action( 'admin_enqueue_scripts', 'myprefix_lt_provider' );
add_action( 'wp_enqueue_scripts', 'myprefix_lt_provider' );
function myprefix_lt_provider() {
if ( wp_script_is( 'sawir-lt-walk', 'registered' ) ) {
wp_enqueue_script( 'myprefix-lt-provider',
plugins_url( 'provider.js', __FILE__ ),
array( 'sawir-lt-walk' ), '1.0.0', true );
}
}
provider.js:
window.SawirLT.translate = function ( text, source, target ) {
return fetch( 'https://example.com/translate', {
method: 'POST',
body: JSON.stringify( { text: text, from: source, to: target } )
} ).then( function ( r ) { return r.json(); } )
.then( function ( j ) { return j.translation; } );
};<h3>Translations</h3>
The plugin’s own admin/UI text is translation-ready (text domain “sawir-live-translate”). A .pot template ships in /languages — drop your .po/.mo there or under wp-content/languages/plugins/. (The in-page editor’s JavaScript labels are not yet localized.)
Other plugins by Sawir Studio
- Sawir Restock Notifier for WooCommerce — let customers request an email when an out-of-stock product is back.
- Sawir Product Image Zoom for WooCommerce — product image lightbox with navigation and click-to-zoom.
- Sawir Variation Gallery Tools for WooCommerce — manage variation-specific gallery images.
- Sawir Role Capabilities Manager — create custom user roles and manage capabilities.