01Two jobs, one word
"Localization" is one word covering two independent tasks. Text translation makes the description and screenshot captions read correctly and naturally in that language. Keyword research finds the term people in that market actually type — and the two often DON'T overlap: a term translated directly from English can be a word nobody searches in the target language.
02How many languages you can actually target
| App Store | Google Play | |
|---|---|---|
| Manually entered metadata language | 48 languages and locales | Whatever list Play Console supports |
| What shows in an untranslated language | A rendering that depends on the customer's store language, device language, and your primary language — not one fixed fallback order | Users can see a machine translation, labeled as auto-generated |
| Does auto-translation always run | No — metadata only shows in the language(s) you entered | Not in 4 languages (Armenian, Raeto-Romance, Tagalog, Zulu), where auto-translation isn't available |
03The fallback trap in a market you left blank
Every country you sell in doesn't need its own metadata row — but the gap is silent: a customer in that market sees your listing in whatever language the fallback resolves to, or a machine translation, and conversion follows that text, not the text you actually wrote. Google Play at least labels it; App Store has no visible warning, since which language renders depends on the customer's own device settings.
- List every storefront you sell in and mark which ones have manually entered metadata versus which are falling back.
- For a high-volume market that's currently falling back, manually written metadata is usually worth the effort before more auto-translated markets — auto-translation doesn't do keyword research.
- For the country-to-language mapping behind each storefront, see App Store storefront country codes.
Frequently asked
Does translating into a language guarantee ranking in that language?
No. Translation makes the text readable; ranking depends on whether the field contains the term people in that market actually search. Those are separate steps — one is grammar, the other is keyword research.
Can I rely on Google Play's auto-translation instead of localizing by hand?
You can, but the customer sees a label marking it as machine-translated, and machine translation doesn't do keyword selection — it's a literal rendering of your source text, not copy optimized for how people search in that language.
Do I need to fill in all 48 App Store languages?
No. Starting with the markets you actually sell in, in order of volume, produces more impact for less work — manually writing metadata for a low-volume storefront usually isn't worth the effort.
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