Set the widget language and the language your bot answers in

There are two separate language settings to think about: the language of the widget's interface (buttons, placeholders and labels), and the language your bot writes its answers in.

Who can do this: team owners and admins.

Supported widget languages

The widget interface is available in English, German, Spanish, French, Italian, Japanese, Chinese, Greek, Polish and Dutch.

Set the widget language

1. Open your bot and select the Channels tab.
2. Click the settings (cog) icon on the Web card.
3. In the Widget behaviour section, choose a language from the Language menu.
4. Click Update settings.
5. Click Embed, copy the widget or iframe code again and replace the old code on your website. The language is part of the embed code.

The language also applies to your bot's own page: the Open bot address gets a language prefix, such as /de/bots/YOUR_BOT_ID.

Control the language of answers

The Language setting only translates the widget's interface. It doesn't tell the bot which language to answer in, and it doesn't translate your welcome message or example questions - those appear exactly as you wrote them in General settings.

Most models reply in the language the visitor writes in. To be sure, say what you want in the bot's instructions, for example:

• "Always reply in the language the customer writes in."
• "Always reply in German, even if the customer writes in another language."

Your knowledge doesn't need to be in the same language as the visitor. The bot can often answer a question asked in Spanish using English documents, but answers are usually better when your key content exists in the languages your customers use.

Multilingual websites

If your site has several language versions, set the widget language per page with window.chatThingConfig instead of the web channel setting. You can also translate the welcome message and example questions for each language:

<script>
  window.chatThingConfig = {
    locale: "fr",
    firstMessageOverride: "Bonjour ! Comment puis-je vous aider ?",
    exampleQuestionsOverride: ["Quels sont vos horaires ?"],
  };
</script>
<script src="https://chatthing.ai/chat-widget.js" type="text/javascript" id="YOUR_BOT_ID" async defer></script>

Put the matching config on each language version of your site. See Customise the widget with code for switching language without a page reload.

Check it works

Open your website in a private or incognito window and open the chat. The message box placeholder and buttons should be in your chosen language. Ask a question in the language your customers use and check the reply.

Troubleshooting

The widget is still in English

The language is written into the embed code. Copy the code from Embed again and replace the code on your site. If you set locale yourself, check it's one of the codes above - an unsupported code falls back to English.

The bot answers in the wrong language

Add a language rule to the bot's instructions, then test again.