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Getting started
From a fresh install to a translated page, the whole setup is four steps and takes a few minutes. Nothing here requires code.
Before you begin
| You need | Why |
|---|---|
| WordPress 6.4 or newer | Gloty uses the block and REST APIs from 6.4 onwards. |
| PHP 8.1 or newer | On PHP 8.0 or older Gloty deactivates itself on activation and shows a notice — your site keeps working. |
| An administrator account |
All Gloty screens require the
manage_options capability.
|
| Outbound HTTPS from your server | Background jobs talk to the Gloty translation service. Page renders never do. |
Take a backup first. Gloty never overwrites your original content — translations are stored separately — but taking a backup before adding any plugin to a production site is always the right habit.
1. Install and activate
Install Gloty the same way as any other plugin:
- In wp-admin go to Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin.
- Choose the
gloty.zipfile and click Install Now. - Click Activate.
On activation Gloty creates its database tables, registers its background jobs, and redirects you to the setup wizard at Gloty → Setup. You can return to the wizard at any time from the sidebar until you finish it.
Updating an existing install? Uploading a newer ZIP over the top is safe. WordPress asks you to confirm the replacement, the plugin stays active, and your translations, languages, and settings all survive — they live in the database, not in the plugin folder.
2. Run the setup wizard
The wizard has five steps: Welcome, Connection, Languages, Content scan, and Ready.
-
Connect your site
Enter your name and email address. Gloty creates your account on the translation service, issues a license, and registers this site against it — including the secure webhook channel the service uses to deliver finished translations back to you.
New accounts start on the Free plan, so you can complete setup and translate without entering payment details. See Plans & billing for quotas and upgrades.
-
Choose your languages
Set your source language — the language your site is written in today — then add one or more target languages. The source language is served at your existing URLs; each target language gets its own URL prefix, such as
/de/.Only add languages you actually intend to publish. Every extra target multiplies the number of strings to translate and the characters billed against your quota.
-
Install language packs
Gloty offers to install the official WordPress language packs for your target languages — core, your active theme, and your plugins. This is the same download as Settings → General → Site Language.
It matters because some interfaces are rendered in the browser by JavaScript — most visibly the WooCommerce Cart and Checkout blocks — and cannot be translated from the page HTML. With the matching language pack installed, WordPress feeds those blocks translated strings directly. Since 1.6.0
-
Scan your content
The content scan walks your published posts, pages, custom post types, and taxonomy terms and registers everything translatable it finds. This builds the initial work queue.
Starting the scan finishes the wizard. The scan continues in the background, and you can watch, pause, or resume it from Gloty → Sync.
3. Run your first translation
Scanning finds strings; it does not translate them. To turn the queue into translations, go to Gloty → Sync and use Generate translations:
- Check the queued count under Step 2 · Generate translations. This is how many pending translation rows are waiting to be sent.
- Click Translate now. Gloty sends the first batches to the translation service immediately rather than waiting for the next scheduled run.
- Watch Recent jobs. Batches move from queued to processing to completed as results arrive.
After the first results land, Gloty keeps working on its own: background dispatch runs about once a minute and drains the rest of the queue without further clicks.
4. See it on the front end
Open your site and add a language prefix to the URL — for example
https://example.com/de/. If a page has been
translated, you will see the translated version, with
<html lang="de"> and the correct
hreflang tags in the source.
To let visitors switch languages themselves, enable the language switcher. It can float in a corner of the page, sit in a widget area, or be placed anywhere with a shortcode.
Not everything appears at once. Strings are discovered as pages render and as the scan progresses, then translated in batches. A page you have never visited in a target language may show untranslated text the first time; load it once, give the queue a minute, and reload.
What to do next
- Check your SEO settings hreflang, canonicals, and sitemap alternates are on by default — confirm they suit your setup.
- Protect your brand names Add product and brand terms to the glossary so they are never mistranslated.
- Review the output Spot-check important pages and correct anything that reads wrong. Your edits are protected.
Uninstalling
Deactivating Gloty stops its background jobs and stops serving translated pages; your data stays in the database and everything resumes when you reactivate.
Deleting the plugin is destructive by design: the uninstaller drops Gloty's tables, deletes its options and transients, and releases the site slot on your license. Export or back up anything you want to keep first.