# Lost in Translations: Bringing the World to Shopify

DevFeed: [Lost in Translations: Bringing the World to Shopify](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/lost-in-translations-bringing-the-world-to-shopify-1472.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://shopify.engineering/lost-in-translations>)

Author: Christian Blais

Published: 2018-10-10T14:30:00Z

Content type: article

Language: en

Sources: [Shopify Engineering](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/shopify-engineering.md>), [Shopify Engineering - Shopify Engineering](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/shopify-engineering-shopify-engineering.md>)

Topics: [Shopify](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/shopify.md>), [Refactoring](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/refactoring.md>), [Code](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/code.md>)

Tags: [code](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/code.md>), [customers](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/customers.md>), [developers](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/developers.md>), [platform](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/platform.md>), [refactoring](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/refactoring.md>), [shopify](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/shopify.md>)

## AI overview

Shopify describes the engineering challenges of expanding its commerce platform internationally. Differences in language, including grammatical gender and pluralization, made it necessary to replace hardcoded English strings, build new tools, and refactor parts of the codebase. The article introduces patterns used to support Shopify's translation efforts.

## Source excerpt

At Shopify, the leading multi-channel commerce platform that powers over 600,000 businesses in approximately 175 countries, we aim at making commerce better for everyone, everywhere. Since Shopify's early days, it's been possible to provide customers with a localized translated experience, but merchants had to understand English to use the platform. Fortunately, things have started to change.