Decision guide · website translation
Which website translator should you choose? Four questions decide.
Before comparing brands, ask four questions: where will your translations live— on your server or a third party's? Subscription or one-time payment? Real indexable pages or a widget? And is the quality measured? The answers point to the right family of tools — here is the honest tour.
The three families of tools
Each family has its own logic. The trap is comparing prices without comparing models.
| Free widget | Subscription SaaS | Owned module (Langharbor) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| What Google sees | One language only | Real translated pages | Real /en/ /es/ pages, hreflang |
| Where translations live | Nowhere (on the fly) | On the provider's servers | In your database — yours |
| Pricing model | Free | ~€15 – 699/month, forever | €99 – 449 paid once |
| If you stop paying | — | Translations stop | The content stays in place |
| Best for | Helping out a visitor | Managed all-in service | Paying once and owning |
1 Where do your translations live?
THE question. A service that serves your translated pages from its own infrastructure makes you dependent: the day you leave, your multilingual site vanishes. A tool that writes the content into your store leaves you the owner, forever.
2 Subscription, or once?
A ~€29/month subscription costs ~€1,044 over 3 years, and the bill keeps running. A one-time payment should be compared to that total, not to the first month. The longer your site lives, the wider the gap.
3 Real pages, or a widget?
Only real pages per language, with their hreflang tags, exist in the eyes of Google and AI assistants. A widget translates the screen — not your presence in the results.
4 Is the quality measured?
Demand numbers, not promises — and the ability to review and correct at home. Our measurements (fidelity, fluency, technical integrity) are published with their limit stated honestly: a representative test bench, not an official label.
Our answer · in full transparency
Pay once, own forever.
Langharbor translates your store — products, categories, pages, meta tags — and writes everything into your database: PrestaShop 1.7/8/9, WooCommerce, WordPress, 110+ languages, from €99 with a lifetime licence. And fairly: if you prefer a managed, all-inclusive service billed by usage, a subscription SaaS remains a defensible choice — we compare honestly in our Weglot guide.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best translator for a website or online store?
The one that answers four questions well: do your translations live on your server or a third party's? Do you pay once or every month? Does it produce real indexable pages (/en/, /es/) or just a widget? And is the quality measured? If you want to pay once and own your translations, Langharbor writes the translated content directly into your store (PrestaShop, WooCommerce, WordPress), from €99 with a lifetime licence.
Do you need a subscription to translate a website?
No. Subscriptions are the model of services that serve your translations from their own infrastructure (Weglot, Linguise…): if you stop paying, the translated pages stop being served. The alternative is a one-time payment with content written into your own database: the translations stay in place, even if you uninstall the tool.
Is a free translation widget enough?
To help out a visitor, yes. To be found, no: a widget translates the screen on the fly but creates no indexable pages — Google and AI assistants only ever see one language. Multilingual SEO requires real pages per language, with their hreflang tags.
Is AI translation good enough for a professional website?
Today's best models produce quality suited to e-commerce — Langharbor publishes its measurements (fidelity, fluency, technical integrity) while stating honestly that they come from a representative test bench, not an official label. You keep control: the translated content lives in your store, so you can review and edit it at will.
How much does website translation cost?
Three orders of magnitude: SaaS subscriptions run from roughly €15 to €699 per month, forever; Langharbor translates a store for €99 to €449 paid once (lifetime licence, depending on the number of languages); and one-off content (documents, videos, voice-over) is pay-per-use, no account needed. The longer your site lives, the more the one-time model wins.
Choose the tool you will still own tomorrow.
From €99, lifetime licence. PrestaShop, WooCommerce, WordPress.