Gloty vs. Polylang
Polylang is the beloved lightweight, free-to-start multilingual plugin. The difference is workflow: Polylang has you translate content by hand, post by post — Gloty translates the whole site automatically.
The short answer
Polylang and Gloty differ in workflow, not data ownership — both keep translations in your own database. Polylang's free version is manual: you create and link a translated post for every language. Its Pro edition (from €99/yr) adds a DeepL integration that requires your own DeepL key and, per Polylang, offers no one-click translate-everything.
Polylang details verified against Polylang’s published pricing.
Polylang is lightweight, native, and has a genuinely capable free version with 800,000+ active installations — you build multilingual sites by creating a linked, translated post for each language. Its Pro edition adds a DeepL assist, but that runs one item at a time, only with DeepL, and doesn't re-sync when you edit the source. Gloty takes the opposite approach: it intercepts your page output and translates the whole site automatically across multiple AI providers, then keeps translations up to date.
Choose Gloty if…
- You want the whole site translated automatically, not post by post
- You don't want to manually create a translated copy of every page
- You want a choice of engines (Google, DeepL, OpenAI, Gemini), not DeepL only
- You want translations to re-sync automatically when you edit the source
Choose Polylang if…
- You want a capable free plugin and are happy translating by hand
- You want full editorial control over each language as a distinct, hand-tuned page
- You prefer a lightweight, native plugin and don't need automatic AI at all
Credit where due
Where Polylang genuinely shines
- A genuinely capable free version — real multilingual sites at €0, with no language or word limits on manual translation.
- Lightweight and native: built on WordPress core taxonomies, well-liked on shared hosting.
- Full editorial control — hand-authored, individually SEO-tunable pages per language, ideal when per-market nuance matters.
- Huge, mature, actively maintained install base (800,000+) with a solid ecosystem.
Where Gloty differs
What you get with Gloty
Automatic, whole-site — not post by post
With Polylang you create and translate a separate linked entity for every page in every language. Gloty intercepts your rendered pages and translates everything automatically, so a 300-page site doesn't mean 300 manual translations per language.
Any AI provider, and it stays in sync
Polylang's machine translation is Pro-only, DeepL-only, requires your own DeepL key, and — per Polylang's own product page — offers no one-click translate-everything. Gloty covers the whole site automatically across Google, DeepL, OpenAI and Gemini, and re-translates changed content as you edit.
WooCommerce and SEO without extra add-ons
Polylang needs a separate paid add-on for WooCommerce and reserves slug/SEO refinements for Pro. Gloty includes WooCommerce translation and a full SEO suite (hreflang, meta, sitemaps) in the box.
Polylang pricing, as published
Transcribed from Polylang’s own pricing page on . We publish the figures rather than characterising them so you can check the comparison yourself.
| Plan | Price | Includes |
|---|---|---|
| Polylang (free) | €0 | Manual translation · no machine translation |
| Polylang Pro — 1 site | €99/yr | 1 site · DeepL integration |
| Polylang Pro — 3 sites | €198/yr | 3 sites |
| Polylang Pro — 5 sites | €297/yr | 5 sites |
| Polylang Pro — 25 sites | €495/yr | 25 sites |
Gloty vs. Polylang — FAQ
- Does Polylang translate automatically?
- Not in the free version — it's fully manual. Polylang Pro adds a DeepL assist, but you trigger it per item, it works only with DeepL, and it doesn't re-sync when you change the source. Gloty translates the whole site automatically and keeps it updated.
- Is Polylang free?
- Yes, the core plugin is free and genuinely useful for hand-translated sites. Gloty is also free to start; the difference is automation — Gloty does the translating for you rather than having you create a translated post per language.
- Do both keep my data local?
- Yes. Both Polylang and Gloty store translations in your own WordPress database, and both serve translated pages without calling out — there's no cloud lock-in with either. Producing a translation is different: Gloty sends the text to the Gloty service, which calls the AI engine, and Polylang Pro's DeepL assist calls DeepL with your key. The real difference is the manual-vs-automatic workflow, not data ownership.
Polylang's core plugin is free and handles manual translation. Polylang Pro starts at €99/yr for a single site and adds a DeepL integration that, per Polylang's own product page, requires your own DeepL API key. Polylang also states that Pro does not provide a one-click "translate everything" feature, and that its DeepL integration is currently not compatible with Elementor and some builders. Polylang is a trademark of its respective owner and is referenced here for factual comparison only. Details verified ; competitor features and pricing change — always confirm on their official site.
Sources
Every factual claim about Polylang on this page is drawn from the primary sources below, each confirmed live on the date shown.
- Polylang Pro — Polylang. Accessed .
- Polylang — WordPress Plugin Directory listing — WordPress.org. Accessed .
- Tell Google about localized versions of your page — Google Search Central. Accessed .
- Internationalization — Plugin Handbook — WordPress Developer Resources. Accessed .
Own your translations. Start free.
Automatic AI translation, stored in your own database, with the provider you already trust.