Translating a website into German means deciding on formality first, Sie or du, then handling the mechanics: detection, machine translation, layout, and a human pass on the pages that matter most. German is worth the setup: it is the native language across Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, and one of the largest e-commerce markets online.
Set up Weglot
- Install: the Weglot plugin (WordPress, Shopify, Squarespace) or the JavaScript snippet on a custom site.
- Pick a URL structure: subdomain (
de.yoursite.com) or subdirectory (yoursite.com/de/), then update your DNS. - Let it scan and translate: Weglot detects your text, images, and metadata and runs them through DeepL, Google Translate, or Microsoft Translator, and keeps translating as you publish new pages.
- Edit and set SEO: adjust translations in the visual editor, keep meta titles and descriptions under 60 and 155 characters, and confirm hreflang tags and translated URL slugs (for example “funktionen” rather than a placeholder) are in place.
That covers getting a German version live. It does not decide Sie or du, or catch the terms a machine gets wrong at scale, which is where AI Glot comes in: a separate tool for the exported file, not a Weglot plugin.
German runs long, and your layout does not:
German joins words into compounds and carries inflections English does not need, so the same sentence comes back visibly longer. The W3C puts average expansion at about 130% for English strings over 70 characters, and short interface labels can run two or three times the source. For a website that is a layout problem and an import problem before it is a language problem.
- Put the character limit in the instruction: a German product title that overruns a marketplace limit is rejected at import however well it is written. State the ceiling and it is applied while each string is written, so the shortening happens in the translation rather than in a spreadsheet afterwards.
- Settle Sie or du once, in the glossary: formality is the first thing a German reader notices. Fixing it in the workspace glossary, next to your brand and category names, is what keeps the twentieth catalogue update consistent with the first.
- Compounds are why word counts mislead: “Kraftfahrzeughaftpflichtversicherung” is a single word, which is exactly why German agencies bill per 55-character line instead. AI Glot measures your actual file and shows the count and the cost in the plan, so you have a real number to hold against the German quote you were given.
- The German premium is human work, not machine work: the counting, the certification and the re-laying out are where the money goes. Run the catalogue and the archive through the engine, and keep the paid native review for the DACH pages that actually sell.
The round trip
- Export your German translations from Weglot as CSV.
- Run the file through AI Glot: describe which columns to translate, your character limits, and whether to use Sie or du, and IDs, URLs, and prices stay untouched.
- Re-import into Weglot and publish.
Conclusion
Weglot gets a German version of your site live fast. Keeping formality and terminology consistent once you have more than a handful of pages is what a glossary and a second pass through AI Glot are for. If you are weighing this against a traditional agency quote, see what German translation actually costs per word and per line, or sign up for free.