Help Center in multiple languages

Overview

You can set up your Help Center to automatically support multiple languages to provide help in the languages your customers speak. You can either have Featurebase automatically translate your help center using AI or manually provide all translations yourself.

We’ll automatically show your users the correct version of the Help Center based on their browser’s language settings. They can also switch between languages manually.

Here are the languages we currently support →

Configuring languages

The default language should be the one that the majority of your users speak. It’s also the fallback language for visitors whose browsers are set to unsupported languages.

To add additional languages:

1. Go to Settings → Help Centers → [your help center] → Language

2. Under language settings, click + Add Language

3. From the dropdown, select your desired language

4. Translate the Help Center UI texts for the language you added

5. Repeat this process for each language added

6. Choose which language should be the default

Automatic AI translation

Featurebase can automatically translate your entire help center, so you only need to write articles in one base language. Translations in other languages are kept up to date automatically using AI.

To set this up:

1. Go to Settings → Help Centers → [your help center] → Auto-translate

2. Add protected terms to your glossary (for example, your brand name or product terms)

3. Click Save glossary.

4. Enable automatic translations

5. And you’re done!

Manual translation

If you’re not using automatic AI translations, each article and collection must be translated manually.

Translating & organizing content

After enabling other languages, you can see all the untranslated collections and articles. For the best user experience, we recommend translating all collections and titles in your Help Center.

To start translating collections:

1. Go to Dashboard → Help center

2. Switch to the language you’re translating (from the upper right corner)

3. Click ‘Add translation’ next to the collections and sub-collections

Translating help articles

After translating collection, you can start translating your articles:

1. Go to Dashboard → Help center

2. Switch to the language you’re translating to see untranslated articles

3. Open an article that ‘Requires translation’ or create a new one

4. Translate the article and click ‘Publish article’ on the top right

Tracking articles’ translation status

You can switch between the language versions of the article from the top left. You can also see which articles have been translated and which ones have not.

• Green means that the article has been translated & published

• Purple means that the translation has been started, but the article is in draft

• Gray means it has not been translated

FAQ

Do translations also work in the Messenger widget?

Yes, the Messenger widget also supports translations automatically based on the user's default browser language.

What happens if I reorder the collection in a specific language view?

If you don’t have Automatic AI translation enabled, you can reorder collections and sections from any language view, and the changes will apply across all languages.

Are the articles of untranslated collections still shown publicly?

If the collection isn’t translated, any articles (even if translated) won’t be visible publicly. However, the articles will still show up in searches and can be shared with customers directly.

However, if a sub-collection is not translated, its translated articles will still be displayed.

What happens if I delete/reorder an article in a specific language view?

When you delete or reorder an article or a collection, it will apply across all languages.

What if I’ve forgotten to translate an article?

We’ll show you the articles and collections you haven’t translated yet in the dashboard. Users can also always switch to your original language to see the articles you haven’t translated yet.

For the best experience, we recommend using Automatic AI translation so you never have to remember to keep translations up to date.

Are the articles of untranslated collections still shown publicly?

If the collection isn’t translated, any articles (even if translated) won’t be visible publicly. However, the articles will still show up in searches and can be shared with customers directly.

However, if a sub-collection is not translated, its translated articles will still be displayed.

What should I choose as the default language for my Help Center?

The default language should be the one the majority of your users speak. It’s also the fallback language for visitors whose browsers are set to unsupported languages.

What happens if I manually edit an article translation and then update the base language?

If you have manually edited a translated article version, automatic translations will skip that locale (so your manual changes won’t be overwritten), as long as that article version is treated as a manual translation.

You can still choose to re-enable the automatic translations for each article at any time if you want the latest base-language changes applied to that locale:

All auto-translated article locales will show the AI autotranslation icon and are locked for editing: