View Categories

How to Translate the Back Button

0:00 2:27
Table of Contents

To show the back button label in the visitor’s language, use the built-in translation options in Back Button Anywhere Widget for WordPress. These are free and work with multilingual plugins that set the standard ICL_LANGUAGE_CODE constant, such as WPML and Polylang.

Option 1: the translate shortcode #

[alg_back_button_translate] outputs different text depending on the active language. It has two forms.

Self-closing form #

Provide all three attributes: lang, lang_text, and not_lang_text.

[alg_back_button_translate lang="FR" lang_text="Retour" not_lang_text="Back"]

When the active language is French, this prints “Retour”; otherwise it prints “Back”.

Enclosing form #

Wrap the text between opening and closing tags. Use lang to show it only for a language, or not_lang to show it for everything except a list.

[alg_back_button_translate lang="FR"]Retour[/alg_back_button_translate]
[alg_back_button_translate lang="DE"]Zurück[/alg_back_button_translate]
[alg_back_button_translate not_lang="FR,DE"]Back[/alg_back_button_translate]

On a French page only “Retour” renders; on a German page only “Zurück”; on any other language only “Back”. You can list several codes, comma-separated.

Option 2: the lang attribute on the button shortcode #

The main [alg_back_button] shortcode accepts lang and not_lang_text. When the active language is not in lang, the label is replaced with not_lang_text.

[alg_back_button lang="FR" label="Retour" not_lang_text="Back"]

Combine the two #

Because [alg_back_button] runs shortcodes inside its label, you can nest the translate shortcode in the label to build a fully localized button:

[alg_back_button label='[alg_back_button_translate lang="FR" lang_text="Retour" not_lang_text="Back"]']

Attributes reference #

Attribute Used in Effect
lang both shortcodes Language code(s) this text applies to.
lang_text [alg_back_button_translate] Text shown when the language matches (self-closing form).
not_lang_text both shortcodes Text shown when the language does not match.
not_lang [alg_back_button_translate] Language code(s) to exclude (enclosing form).

Good to know #

  • Language codes are matched case-insensitively, so FR and fr behave the same.
  • These options read the active language from ICL_LANGUAGE_CODE. If no multilingual plugin sets it, the non-matching text is used.
  • The fa (Font Awesome) attribute and the lang label swap cannot be combined in one [alg_back_button]. Use separate shortcodes if you need both an icon and a translated label.

Get more control #

Translation is free. Back Button Anywhere Widget for WordPress Pro adds menu placement, a floating button, and hide/show rules. See what Pro unlocks.