Untranslated content on multilingual sites

Where untranslated text hides

The main text is usually translated in one go, at launch. What stays in the other language gets in by other routes.

• Sections added after the translation. The page was translated in full, then expanded in one language only.
• Messages your theme or a plugin displays: an empty list, a search with no results, a button. They come from a language file, not from your pages, so they never reach your translator.
• Missing translation keys. When a string is missing from that file, some template engines print the key itself, something like "Translation missing: fr.…".
• Menus, the footer and form error messages, which live outside the content you translate page by page.

An automatic translation plugin does not catch everything. It translates the text it finds in your pages; text inside an image, or text a third-party service injects into the page, slips past it.

Why one missed heading matters

Visitors land on the version in their language. If the first heading they read is in another one, they wonder whether they are in the right place, and whether the rest of the site was translated with the same care.

Google recommends using a single language for content and navigation on each page, and avoiding side-by-side translations. It works out a page's language from its visible content, not from the code.

For screen reader users, WCAG success criterion 3.1.2 (level AA) asks that the language of each passage be identified, so the right pronunciation rules apply. A passage left in the other language by mistake is not marked as such, so it is read with the rules of the page's language.

What we find on the multilingual sites we audit

This percentage covers about 20 websites we audited between August 14, 2026 and September 24, 2026, the ones where this point could be checked. Many were audited because a defect showed up quickly, so the figure describes our audits, not websites in general.

What the audit compares, version against version

The audit pairs each page with its version in the other language, the one the page itself declares as its equivalent. We go looking for those versions even when no link leads there: on many sites the language switcher is a form that ordinary crawlers never get past.

We then compare the prose headings of both versions. A heading that is identical in both languages is untranslated content. The report gives its position on the page: a heading at the top is the first thing a visitor in that language reads.

Each page is also read on its own. An English theme message on a French page, a translation key printed as is, or a field label nobody filled in is reported as placeholder text left on the live site: text the visitor was never meant to read.

What is allowed to stay identical

A brand, product or tool name is spelled the same in every language, and so are most short menu items. The audit only counts sentences: a heading of several words, built like a sentence in its language.

A customer review left in its original language is not a defect. Translating it would rewrite someone's testimony. That call is made by reading, and the report states it.

Quick fixes, and fixes that take a project

A missed heading or a theme message is quick to fix once you know where it is. Finding it is the slow part, because it means reading both versions side by side.

When the misses repeat from page to page, the problem is no longer a page: content gets published in one language and the translation never follows. What needs a second look then is the publishing process, with whoever runs the site.

What this check doesn't tell you

By Quentin Mathis, Z29K · updated September 28, 2026