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Lokalise

Lokalise Expert gives your team a shared workspace for translating app text and returning it in the files your app reads.

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What do you give a translator in Lokalise?

Start with the source file for one screen. Lokalise Expert organizes the text by keys, the stable names your app uses to find each label or message. Include a short explanation of when the message appears.

A booking screen might use “Cancel” both to close a dialog and to cancel an actual appointment. Give those actions separate keys if their meaning differs. Tell the translator which action each label controls.

How can you spot labels that will not fit?

Try pseudolocalization, a test that replaces source text with visibly altered or longer text. Lokalise documents it in Expert. Vantage does not currently offer this feature. A longer label can reveal where a narrow screen clips text before the translation is ready.

  1. Sketch a narrow booking screen
    Draw a confirmation button and the label “Confirm booking.” Write a deliberately longer version beside it on paper. No project, upload or export is needed.
  2. Choose what should happen
    Mark whether the button should grow or the text should wrap. Keep the whole action readable. The altered text tests layout only. Have someone review real translations separately.
  3. Mark the text that must stay out of a release
    Write a separate label for the test language in your handoff. Put a missing translation next to it and write whether the release should wait or show approved fallback text.

Which translation will your app get back?

Expert can export only reviewed strings or the last reviewed version. If someone changes a reviewed label, the last-reviewed setting can still return the previous wording. Decide how to handle empty translations separately.

Open the exported file before shipping. Check that its keys and variables, such as the slot for an appointment time, still match what the app expects. Keep the released files, source file and export choices together.

Which work affects the Lokalise plan?

Paid pricing distinguishes stored text from processed words and advanced seats. Processed words measure translation activity. Advanced seats are for roles such as managers and developers. Lokalise lists unlimited hosted words and translator and reviewer seats on paid plans.

Check which roles your team needs and how the plan counts the work you expect each month. Verify the allowance for any translation or automation feature you plan to use.