Mirela
Let’s talk about creating a well-structured multilingual URL, because this is an overlooked subject. URLs are part of your product’s user experience too, so take care of these too during localization. Well-crafted URLs are useful for users, search engines, teams, and basically everyone who comes in contact with your content. Learn how to get them right.
Choose a URL structure that scales
When you introduce multilingual content, you’re basically building multiple versions of your website. The first decision is how to structure your URLs. What comes next like content management, SEO, analytics, and more, is tied to that.
There’s no right structure, but rather the right approach for your business. Three common options stand out:
Subdirectoriesexample.com/en/
These are simple, easy to scale, and SEO-friendly. Probably the best pick if your main domain has authority.
Subdomainsen.example.com
They offer clean separation for teams/servers. This makes them great if you prefer infrastructure flexibility.
Country-code top-level domains (ccTLDs)example.fr
You get strong geo-targeting signal, so you can choose them if your localization is heavily market-specific. ccTLDs are more expensive to manage and register, though.
Use language codes users recognize
You don’t have to reinvent the wheel when it comes to your multilingual URL, just stick to ISO language codes (like en, es, zh) and add region codes only when you truly need them (en-us, es-mx). If a user or linguist can guess the code without thinking, you’re doing it right. Plus, search engines appreciate clarity too.
Use regional variants when the content truly differs by market (as in pricing, legal terms, cultural references, or different product offerings) and skip them if your content is identical across a whole language group.
Keep localized slugs human-friendly
Slugs tell users what a page is about even before they click. The thing is, you must decide how far to take localization. You can either localize your slugs or keep slugs in a single language. Let’s look at the advantages and disadvantages. You decide.
| Localize slug | Keep in a single language | |
|---|---|---|
| Advantages | Better UX for non-English markets, enhanced SEO if local search behavior matters, reinforces commitment to genuine localization | Less room for translation errors, predictable structure across all markets, faster rollout for new languages |
| Disadvantages | They multiply your QA workload. You’ll need linguistic review, consistency checks, and slug-specific glossaries. | It may feel slightly less local, especially in markets where English isn’t common. |
Whichever path you choose, just make sure to make slugs short, descriptive, lowercase, hyphen-separated, and free of filler words.
Keep characters clean
You know how messy some URL look? Those packed with encoded characters. They look so spammy. Certain scripts (e.g., Japanese, Chinese, Arabic, and Cyrillic) can balloon into long encoded strings in some contexts. Search engines can technically parse them, but users may hesitate to click or copy them.
Be consistent across all your languages
When it comes to URLs, to be consist means to use the same separators and casing, maintain the same structures across locales, and avoid mixing singular or plural forms from language to language (unless linguistically required, of course).
Users need your URLs to behave the same, regardless of the language they select. Apart from users, your localization team will also appreciate that they can predict URL patterns and your SEO team gets a cleaner architecture. Everyone wins.
Redirect smartly
The thing with automatic location-based redirects is that they’re not always helpful and you may end up frustrating users. This is very true for multilingual or multicultural markets. You can also encounter situations when users are just traveling and would prefer content in their language, or when VPNs or corporate proxies skew the detected location.
A better approach would be to simply let users access the version they prefer. You could offer a subtle prompt like “Want to switch to X language?” and then remember that selection for next time using cookies or account preferences.
Wrapping up
A small detail in the grand world of localization, that’s what a multilingual URL is. Nonetheless, it plays a powerful role in shaping the experience your global audience, so choose the right structure, stay consistent, and plan ahead.