All too often, product teams limit their user research too close to home. Conducting multilingual user research inevitably takes a backseat due to the complexities of translation. The outcome? You miss out on cultural nuances that make the fine line between an average and winning user experience as you expand globally. Fortunately, modern AI-powered research methods and tools can help scale research efforts across different markets effectively.
The Importance of Multilingual User Research
Collect comprehensive, data-driven demographic insights
Each language group has its own nuanced traditions and social norms, which might only be uncovered thanks to thorough multilingual research. Identifying cultural differences means you’re equipped with a diverse set of data and insights that help you localize your products accordingly. When dealing with different demographics, residences, and nationalities, it’s also mandatory to speak their native language to avoid language bias.
Reduces cognitive load and friction
When users do not need to mentally convert information (such as currencies, dates, or measurements), their experience becomes more intuitive and enjoyable. Increases user engagement and retention. Users are more likely to engage with a product when the experience is tailored to their language, cultural expectations, and behaviors.
For example: Netflix doesn’t just translate its interface; it also localizes content recommendations. For instance, in India, Bollywood films are prominently featured, while in Japan, anime content is prioritized.
Information Architecture & User Flow Expectations
A well-localized interface removes barriers to navigation, making it easier for users to interact with a product. Users are more likely to complete actions (such as signing up or making a purchase) when the UX feels natural in their language and cultural context. For example: Regional Payment Preferences In different regions, users have distinct preferences for payment flows and methods. In China, mobile payment solutions like WeChat Pay and Alipay dominate the market, requiring specific UI patterns for QR code scanning. In contrast, European markets often prefer direct bank transfers through services like SOFORT or iDEAL, necessitating different checkout flows and trust indicators.
Navigate through cultural differences
Your product might come across differently geographically compared to the local market you’re used to. Global success becomes more achievable when you’re clued up on what different people prefer, what they dislike, what their common pain points are, and what they might expect from your products. The last thing you want to do is to discourage a whole market with something unsuitable, off-putting, or even worse, offensive. What’s right for one culture, might not be for another.
Linguistic accuracy
Linguistic Accuracy and Cultural Context Historical examples demonstrate the importance of proper localization. In 2009, HSBC Bank’s “Assume Nothing” campaign showed how direct translation without cultural context can lead to costly mistakes. More recently, in 2023, major platforms like TikTok and Instagram have invested heavily in AI-powered localization tools that consider not just language, but also cultural context, slang, and regional preferences to ensure their interfaces resonate with local users.
Expands market reach and revenue
Companies that invest in UX localization gain a competitive advantage by making their product more accessible to non-English speakers. For example: Shopify provides localized checkout experiences, adapting to regional payment methods (e.g., Klarna in Europe, iDEAL in the Netherlands, and MercadoPago in Latin America). By ensuring that users see familiar payment options, Shopify increases conversion rates and global adoption.
One brand voice in multiple languages
Ensuring internationalization is at the heart of your UX design means delivering a consistent yet locally relevant experience, no matter where your users are. If any part of the experience your product provides contradicts your brand’s values, you risk alienating users and losing credibility. Brand voice and experience are the most important parts of your multilingual strategy. After all, if your brand comes across as different for each audience, then it’s essentially a different company in each market. Does your English brand message mean the same thing in Mandarin Chinese, Spanish, French, and Arabic? You can lose control of your brand perception and risk offering lower-quality experiences that don’t connect with local audiences if you use translations that don’t align with your brand.
Implementing a Localized User Experience
The interface of your product is the most noticeable element and usually the place where international users are most likely to notice localization issues, so it must be designed considering internationalization.
Considering language length and font sizes
Foreign language equivalents of texts tend to be either shorter or longer. In some cases, the difference can be dramatic. For example, the word “user” in English is usually translated to “Benutzer” in German (twice as many characters) and “utilisateur” in French(almost three times as many characters). Minimum font sizes that work (just) with languages like English may make other more complex language characters unreadable: 漢字, for instance. Regardless of the font size or line height, the characters for any localized language must be readable. This may mean increasing minimum values for all language versions or possibly using different layout criteria for different locales.
Using double-length pre- or pseudo-localization to find problems
Word length problems caused by volume expansion as in the English/German/French example above can be detected by making a double-length version of separated text strings and displaying this double-length version. Text overruns will be much more obvious.
Implementing Scalable Localization Frameworks
Choosing a proper translation management system is vital for your go-to-market strategy. Using translation management systems (TMS) to centralize content. Integrate machine translation with human review for efficiency. Simplifying communications with customers and partners you serve right from the platform only helps build a more positive user experience.
Handling app localization UX issues caused by layouts
A layout that is lined up nicely in the default language may become distorted as it struggles to display foreign language equivalents. Efforts to standardize one set of dimensions for a language with medium space requirements may not work either, especially when volume expansion and contraction can double or halve text lengths, respectively.
Supporting right-to-left and left-to-right languages
Right-to-left (RTL) languages such as Arabic and Hebrew not only change the direction of text compared to English, for instance, but they also change notions of time and sequences of actions. App interfaces that are highly dependent on lateral movement to make their logic and user experience work properly for LTR languages may need to be rethought and redesigned for RTL languages if the same quality of UX is to be achieved.
Implementing Scalable Localization Frameworks
Use translation management systems (TMS) to centralize content. Integrate machine translation with human review for efficiency.
Conclusion
As digital platforms expand globally, the need for multilingual UX optimization will continue to grow. Brands strive to maintain a consistent voice across all markets, but this can be challenging due to linguistic and cultural differences.
https://phrase.com/blog/posts/app-localization-developers-guide-to-user-experience/
https://www.smartling.com/blog/multilingual-ux
https://wondering.com/blog/the-guide-to-multilingual-user-research-with-ai
https://stptrans.com/ux-localisation-how-to-design-a-digital-experience-that-crosses-borders/
https://lingoport.com/blog/localization-examples-6-successes-and-2-failures/