Learn five methods to translate Shopify variant option labels like Color and Size for non-English international stores.
TL;DR: Shopify doesn’t auto-translate variant option labels like “Color” or “Size” when you add a new language. The best fix is Shopify’s free Translate & Adapt app, which supports both option names and option values. If that doesn’t work for your theme, there are fallback methods. For the visual side of localization (product images with embedded text), you’ll need a tool like Image Translate Easy. This guide walks through every method.
You’ve spent weeks setting up your Shopify store in French. The navigation says “Accueil.” Product descriptions read beautifully. Even the checkout is translated. Then a customer lands on a product page and sees: Color: Black.
That’s the moment your carefully localized store feels half-finished.
This is one of the most common frustrations for European Shopify merchants, particularly those importing products from suppliers like Printify or any English-language marketplace. Variant option names arrive in English by default, and Shopify doesn’t auto-translate them when you add a new language to your store.
The result? “Couleur” in your navigation, “Color” on the product page. Customers notice. And it costs you conversions.
Before we get into the fix, it helps to understand what Shopify considers translatable. Variant options have two parts:
Both need translating. A German customer should see “Farbe: Schwarz”, not “Color: Black” or a mix of both. Shopify’s Translation API supports translating both, but you need to do it explicitly. Nothing happens automatically.
Shopify’s free Translate & Adapt app is the best starting point, and for most stores it’s all you need.
Open the app, select the language you want to translate to, then navigate to your product. Scroll down to the Product options section. You’ll see two translatable fields:
The app also offers an Auto-translate button that can translate option names and values alongside your product title, description, and other fields. For stores with many products, this saves significant time.
Important: You need to do this for every product. If you import 20 new products next week, those arrive with English option names and need to be translated too. The Auto-translate feature makes this manageable, but it’s not a set-and-forget solution.
If you’ve translated everything in the app but your storefront still shows “Color” instead of “Farbe”, the problem is almost always your theme. Some themes read variant option names directly from the product data instead of pulling from Shopify’s translation layer. In that case, the translation exists in the system, but the theme ignores it.
Check your storefront in the target language. If the translation doesn’t appear, try switching to a different theme temporarily. If the translation shows up in the other theme, you’ve confirmed a theme compatibility issue. Contact your theme developer or consider one of the fallback methods below.
Some Shopify themes use their own translation keys for common variant labels like “Color” and “Size”, separate from the product data. If your theme does this, you can translate those labels through the theme editor.
Go to Online Store > Themes > … > Edit default theme content. Search for “Color” or “Size.” If your theme has a translation key for these, you’ll see them listed. Replace the value with your localized version.
When this helps: For themes that render variant labels from their own language files rather than from the product’s option name field. Dawn (Shopify’s default theme) and many popular themes work this way for common option names.
When this doesn’t help: If your theme outputs the raw option name from the product data. In that case, the theme language editor has no effect on variant labels. Also, this only covers your primary language. For multi-language stores, you need Method 1 (Translate & Adapt) for each additional language.
Shopify treats “Size” as a special option name in some themes. When a variant option is named exactly “Size”, themes may apply specific styling, like showing strikethrough text for sold-out sizes. If you rename “Size” to “Taille” or “Grootte” at the product data level, that styling can break.
This is another reason to prefer the Translate & Adapt approach (Method 1) over renaming the actual product data: the translation layer preserves the original option name while displaying the translated version to customers.
If your store operates in a single language and that language isn’t English, you can rename variant options at the product level. Open the product in your Shopify admin, find the variant options, and change “Color” to “Couleur” directly.
For a handful of products, this is straightforward. For larger catalogs, you have two bulk options:
CSV export/import: Export your products, find-and-replace “Color” with “Couleur” in the Option1 Name column, then re-import. But be careful: Shopify’s documentation warns that changing option value columns can delete existing variant IDs and create new ones. This can break third-party app integrations, analytics tracking, and any system that references specific variant IDs. Always export a backup first and test with a small batch.
Shopify API: If you’re comfortable with code, you can script the renaming through Shopify’s Admin API. This gives you more control but carries the same risk of variant ID changes.
The downside: Renaming the actual option name changes it for everyone. If you later add a second language, you’ll need to undo this and switch to Translate & Adapt anyway. This method only makes sense for stores that will never need multiple languages.
If Translate & Adapt isn’t meeting your needs (or you want a more automated workflow), several third-party apps handle variant option translation along with the rest of your store content.
| App | Variant Labels | Variant Values | Images | Pricing Model |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Translate & Adapt (Shopify) | Yes | Yes | No | Free |
| Langify | Yes | Yes | No | Paid |
| Weglot | Yes | Yes | No | Paid |
| Translation Lab | Yes | Yes | No | Freemium |
All of these apps translate text: titles, descriptions, option labels, option values. But notice the “Images” column. None of them handle product image translation. If your product images contain text like size charts, care instructions, or feature callouts, those stay in the original language regardless of which text translation app you use.
That’s where Image Translate Easy fills the gap. It works alongside any text translation app to display language-specific product images automatically based on the customer’s selected language.
This deserves its own section because it’s where the frustration compounds.
When you import products from Printify, Printful, or similar print-on-demand services, variant options always arrive in English. “Color: Black”, “Size: S/M/L/XL.” The supplier’s system doesn’t know what language your store uses.
Every new product import resets the problem. You translate your existing catalog, then import 20 new t-shirt designs, and “Color” is back on your storefront.
The fix: Build translation into your product import workflow. After each import batch:
Yes, it adds a step. But skipping it means your French customers see “Couleur” on old products and “Color” on new ones. Inconsistency looks worse than no translation at all.
Running a store in multiple languages adds a layer of complexity. Shopify Markets lets you assign languages to specific regions with language-based URL routing (/fr/, /de/, etc.). The translation layer sits on top of your product data.
Here’s what you need to know about variant options in this setup:
When variant labels aren’t translating, check three things in order: Is the translation saved in Translate & Adapt? Does your theme support the Translation API for variant labels? Is the customer actually viewing the store in the right language? Most issues trace back to one of these.
Here’s a step-by-step workflow to get variant options properly translated. Do this once, and new products become straightforward to handle.
Translating variant options in Shopify isn’t complicated once you know where to look. Translate & Adapt handles both option names and values, and for most themes that’s all you need. The common mistake is not realizing these fields need manual translation in the first place.
If your theme doesn’t pick up the translations, the theme language editor or a third-party translation app can fill the gap. And for single-language stores, renaming options directly works too, just watch out for variant ID changes if you’re doing it via CSV.
Remember: variant labels are just one piece of the localization puzzle. Your product descriptions, navigation, and checkout might be perfectly translated, but if your product images still show English text, customers will notice. Complete localization means every element a customer sees, text and images, matches their language.
Want to tackle the image side of localization next? Check out our complete guide to translating product images in Shopify, or try Image Translate Easy to see how automatic image localization works.