Translate a WordPress Site into Simplified Chinese
To put a WordPress site into Simplified Chinese, you translate the theme and plugin .po/.pot files, plus the WPML XLIFF export for posts and pages. Manuce returns those same files with only the values translated and every placeholder and tag checked. You then compile the .mo, set Chinese fonts and adjust the date format.
What it costs
For the language files of a WordPress site totalling about 6,000 words, into Chinese (Simplified):
To understand, internal use.
Ready to send, by the technical specialist.
Cross-checked. For documents that commit you.
Price for one language, original layout included. VAT not applicable — article 293 B of the French General Tax Code (CGI). The exact quote, based on your file's word count, is shown before you pay.
What changes when WordPress goes Chinese
Simplified Chinese is written without spaces between words and uses full-width punctuation. A theme label such as Search: becomes 搜索：, and Read more… becomes 阅读更多……. The text has two to three times fewer characters than English, but each character is wider, so a button or menu item takes up roughly the same room. You rarely need wider buttons; line height is the thing to watch, as values tuned for Latin text often feel cramped with hanzi.
Word order changes, which matters for strings with several placeholders. Posted on %1$s by %2$s can become 由 %2$s 发布于 %1$s, but only if the source uses numbered placeholders (%1$s, %2$s) rather than two plain %s. Where a theme uses plain %s twice, the translation has to keep the source order.
Chinese has no grammatical plural: its only CLDR category is other. In a .po file, %d comment / %d comments takes a single form, %d 条评论, and the header should read Plural-Forms: nplurals=1; plural=0;.
What Manuce returns, and what it does not do
Manuce translates the files you upload:
- Themes and plugins: a .pot comes back as a target-language .po, ready to compile into .mo with Poedit or Loco Translate; an existing .po comes back translated.
- Content managed by WPML: the XLIFF export comes back in the same format, ready to import again.
The returned file is the same file: indentation, entry order, quotes, comments, line endings, encoding and BOM are preserved; only the values change. Each translated value is compared with the source, so a lost or altered %1$s or a tag such as <span class="screen-reader-text"> is caught. If a mismatch persists, the source value is kept and the report says so.
Not translated: keys, empty values, URLs, email addresses, numbers, colours, date formats, identifiers and anything marked as non-translatable. In practice, a theme string such as F j, Y stays as it is; enter Y年n月j日 yourself if you want a Chinese-style date.
Manuce does not compile the .mo, does not edit your CSS and does not produce sworn or certified translations: if terms and conditions for the Chinese market must be certified, you need an accredited translator.
Fonts and layout: the main trap
A Latin font has no Chinese characters. If your theme loads a Latin web font for headings, browsers fall back to whatever system font they find for the hanzi, often a poor match and occasionally empty boxes on some devices. Give the Chinese version a font stack that covers the script, for example "PingFang SC", "Microsoft YaHei", "Noto Sans SC", sans-serif.
- Italics and capitals: Chinese characters have no true italic and no case, so
text-transform: uppercaseor wide letter-spacing on headings no longer does anything useful. - Line breaks: with no spaces, a Chinese line can break between almost any two characters; check that no CSS rule forces odd breaks in narrow columns or sidebars.
- Mixing Chinese and numbers:
%d 条评论and%d条评论are both common; what matters is consistency across the site.
Preparing the files and checking the result
Before uploading, gather the .pot or .po files for the active theme and for every plugin visitors actually see, plus the WPML XLIFF export for pages and posts. Admin-only plugins can be left out if the dashboard stays in your own language.
After delivery:
- Open the .po in Poedit or Loco Translate, confirm the language is
zh_CNand that the plural header declares a single form. - Name the files after the locale, for example
myplugin-zh_CN.po, then generate the .mo. - Read the report: strings left in the source language because of a placeholder or tag need fixing by hand.
- Browse the Chinese site on a phone: menus, footer, forms, error messages and dates.
Targeting Taiwan or Hong Kong instead? Traditional Chinese is a separate language at Manuce, ordered on its own (locale zh_TW or zh_HK).
How the price is worked out for Chinese
The quote appears as soon as you upload and counts only the words in the values to translate, keys and tags excluded: in msgid "Leave a comment", only the three words count, whatever your source language. Chinese carries a ×1.6 coefficient on the per-word rate. A free sample, one paragraph of your file translated at the level you choose, lets you judge the Chinese output before paying.
In practice
- Export the theme and plugin .pot/.po files, and the WPML XLIFF for your content.
- Upload the files, choose Simplified Chinese and check the free sample.
- Download the translated files and the report of strings left untouched.
- Compile the .po files into .mo (Poedit, Loco Translate) and re-import the XLIFF into WPML.
- Set a Chinese font stack and date format, then review the site on mobile.
Frequently asked questions
Does Manuce translate posts and pages, or only the theme?
Both, provided you supply the right files: .po/.pot for the theme and plugins, and the WPML XLIFF export for posts and pages. Content typed into the editor is not in the .po files, so without an XLIFF export it is not translated.
Why are some strings still in English?
Either they fall into what is never translated (URLs, email addresses, date formats, identifiers), or a placeholder or tag could not be preserved exactly. In that case the source value is kept and the report lists the string and the reason.
Do I need a separate file for Taiwan or Hong Kong?
Yes. Simplified Chinese serves mainland China and Singapore; Traditional Chinese is a separate language at Manuce with its own WordPress locale. It is ordered separately, and the multi-language discount applies from two languages.
My theme shows boxes instead of characters. Is the translation broken?
No, it is the font: a Latin font contains no hanzi. Add a CSS font stack that covers Simplified Chinese, such as PingFang SC, Microsoft YaHei or Noto Sans SC.
How are plural strings handled in the .po file?
Chinese has a single form. Check that the .po header declares nplurals=1; each plural entry then needs just one translation, for example “%d 条评论” for “%d comment / %d comments”.
The specialist in charge
This subject goes to Dédale, the technical specialist. See how it works.
The same file, into another language
Into Chinese (Simplified), other files
See also
Try it on your own file, free
A sample of your file translated at the level you choose, before any payment. You judge, then you decide.