Translating a marketing page is straightforward. Translating technical documentation is not. The failure modes are specific, predictable, and damaging when they occur.
Here are the five most common ways technical doc translation goes wrong — and what correct output looks like. Every "correct" example below links to a live translated site you can verify yourself.
Jest is the most widely used JavaScript testing framework, with over 100 million monthly npm downloads. Its documentation includes getting-started guides, configuration reference, a full API reference for matchers and mocks, and framework-specific guides for React, TypeScript, webpack, and more.
We translated the entire Jest documentation site into 7 languages: German, Spanish, French, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese (Brazilian), and Chinese (Simplified).
Prettier is one of the most widely used code formatters in the JavaScript ecosystem, with over 48,000 GitHub stars. Its documentation covers installation, configuration, editor integration, language support, and API reference — a mix of prose, code samples, and configuration examples that makes translation non-trivial.
We translated the entire Prettier documentation site into 7 languages: German, Spanish, French, Japanese, Korean, Swedish, and Chinese (Simplified).