this post was submitted on 04 Jul 2025

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487

why are website language switchers in the current language? (lemmy.world)

submitted 2 days ago by beerclue@lemmy.world to c/asklemmy@lemmy.world

152 comments fedilink hide all child comments

This always annoys me. I land on a site that's in a language I don't understand (say, Dutch), and I want to switch to something else. I open the language selector and... it's all in Dutch too. So instead of Germany/Deutchland, Romania/România, Great Britain, etc, I get Duitsland and Roemenië and Groot-Brittannië...

How does that make any sense? If I don't speak the language, how am I supposed to know what Roemenië even is? In some situations, it could be easier to figure it out, but in some, not so much. "German" in Polish is "Niemiecki"... :|

Wouldn't it be way more user-friendly to show the names in their native language, like Deutsch, Română, English, Polski, etc?

Is there a reason this is still a thing, or is it just bad UX that nobody bothers to fix?

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[–] tiramichu@sh.itjust.works 39 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (4 children)

The reality is, it varies.

I just opened the language picker on the first site I had in my browser tabs (happened to be Epic games) and they display the language list using native names for the target language, rather than current language (screenshot attached)

I agree it's much better to do it this way.

As a developer, why it doesn't happen sometimes could just be by accident. If you intentionally set out to localise a site and put all text and menu elements into localisation files to be translated, then the language names are going to end up getting translated too. It takes conscious thought and UX design to realise that it's better for accessibility if that single part of the site is actually just static text, regardless of what language is selected.

And before anyone suggests using country flags in your language picker as a cool solution - please don't, because that sucks too. There isn't a 1:1 relationship between countries and languages and so the flag approach is a flawed compromise at best, and actually insulting at worst.

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[–] emeralddawn45@lemmy.dbzer0.com 14 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Ive had multiple situations on websites or in games where i accidentally switched the language to like- japanese or something and then had to fumble around trying to switch it back. On websites at least you can translate to find the right option but i recently installed a game on my steamdeck and the input was all screwed up, and while trying to fix it i accidentally switched the language and then navigated away from the menu. Trying to get back to the right setting with broken input and not understanding anything wasnt fun.

[–] psud@aussie.zone 1 points 1 day ago

The most recent update to Libre Office reset my UI language to one I don't know well enough to recognise. I uninstalled and reinstalled it.

[–] mechoman444@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago

You don't speak dutch? 🤮

[–] irelephant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 18 points 2 days ago

Because they didn't think it through.

[–] curlywurly@lemmy.world 18 points 2 days ago (3 children)

this is a region switcher, rather than a language switcher (the website may of course be conflating the two, though)

[–] beerclue@lemmy.world 15 points 2 days ago

You are right, it is a region switcher. I didn't realize that, maybe because the "change region" button was in a language I didn't know? :)

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[–] hansolo@lemmy.today 13 points 2 days ago (22 children)

Just bad UX design. Typically this should include flags or the language's name in the language if they really did a good job.

[–] Nalivai@discuss.tchncs.de 22 points 2 days ago (1 children)

What flag is for English? What flag is for Portuguese? What about Austria, do they got a language? What do we put under Chinese flag, Mandarin? Where do Cantonese go? Oh, what about Belarusian? There are at least three options, and two could get you in jail, choose carefully.

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[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 6 points 2 days ago

The language selectors in the system I have built are either English or native. And I can tell you, implementing and verifying over 100 languages in their native writing is quite a challenge.

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