Software, apps, games, e-learning and marketing, adapted for each market in 326 languages.
Last reviewed August 23, 2026 by the Prism Linguistics editorial team
Localization adapts your product for a market, not just its words: currencies, date formats, units, imagery, idiom and regulatory references all change with the locale. Prism Linguistics localizes software, apps, games, e-learning and marketing campaigns in 326 languages, using native in-market linguists. Send your files for a free quote and we reply within 60 minutes during business hours.
We work in both directions. Foreign companies entering the US market need their product to read like it was written here, with dollar pricing, MM/DD/YYYY dates, imperial units and American idiom. US companies going abroad need the reverse. Either way, the strings are translated without touching your code, and the result is checked in context before your users see it.
Translation converts the words. Localization adapts the whole product: currencies, date and number formats, units of measure, imagery, idiom, and the regulatory references your content leans on. A translated app can be word-for-word correct and still feel foreign, because the prices are in the wrong currency, the dates read backwards, and the examples name institutions the user has never heard of.
Picture a German software product translated perfectly into English for American users. Dates still appear as 03.04.2026, which an American reads as March 4 when the developer meant April 3. Prices show in euros with a decimal comma. The sign-up form rejects every ZIP code typed into it. The privacy page cites GDPR where a US audience expects plain-English privacy practice, or HIPAA for health data. Every word is correct. The product still is not American.
That gap is what localization closes. Translation is a component of the job, not the whole of it, which is why localization applies to anything interactive or market-facing: software, mobile apps, games, e-learning, campaigns. For flat documents that simply need accurate translation, our document translation services are usually the better fit, and pages, blogs and product listings belong with website translation.
Product types we adapt most often, for foreign companies entering the US and for US companies going abroad.
Desktop, web and mobile interfaces from XLIFF, JSON, .resx, .strings and PO files. Placeholders, variables and keys come back untouched, and store listings are covered too.
Courses, modules and assessments: on-screen text, voiceover scripts, quiz answers that have to stay correct, and captions through our subtitling service.
Slogans, ads, landing pages and email sequences adapted rather than translated, so the idiom lands. Print collateral runs through brochure translation.
In-game text, menus, item names, dialogue and store pages, worked to character limits and to the tone the game is written in.
Manuals, help centers, setup guides and safety warnings, with units, part names and warnings adapted to the market they ship into.
Foreign products prepared for American users: dollar pricing, US date and address formats, imperial units, US spelling and US regulatory references.
"Spanish" is not one locale, and choosing the wrong one is the most common localization mistake we see in US projects. A campaign written for Madrid reads as foreign in Miami or Houston. The US Hispanic market mixes speakers with roots in Mexico, Cuba, Puerto Rico and Central America, which is why es-US exists as its own target locale.
| Content element | Spain (es-ES) | Mexico (es-MX) | US Hispanic (es-US) |
|---|---|---|---|
| "Computer" | ordenador | computadora | computadora |
| "Cell phone" | móvil | celular | celular |
| Currency shown | euro (EUR) | Mexican peso (MXN) | US dollar (USD) |
| Informal plural "you" | vosotros | ustedes | ustedes |
| Units of measure | metric | metric | often imperial alongside metric |
The same splits exist elsewhere: Portuguese for Brazil versus Portugal, French for Canada versus France, Chinese in Simplified versus Traditional script. Tell us who your users actually are and we will recommend the right locale, or prepare more than one from the same source. Our language list covers 326 languages, locale variants included.
Three assets carry a localization project, and all three outlive the first release.
A glossary settles the contested terms before translation starts: product names, feature names, the words your industry argues about. Decided once, applied everywhere, so "Dashboard" does not become three different words on three different screens.
Translation memory stores every approved translation, sentence by sentence. Repeated strings are reused rather than retranslated, which keeps wording consistent and stops you paying twice for the same sentence. On ongoing products, each release we handle only the new and changed strings.
In-context review is the step a spreadsheet cannot replace. A string list will not show you that a heading is clipped at 22 characters, or that a placeholder resolved into a garbled sentence. Where a build, staging site or preview exists, a linguist walks the product as a user would and reports findings keyed to string IDs. If you already have localized strings and just want an independent check, our proofreading service gives them a second read.
Translated text rarely occupies the same space. German, Polish and Finnish commonly run longer than English, exactly where fixed-width buttons give way, while Chinese and Japanese usually run shorter. Send your character limits up front and we work inside them, or tell you honestly when a limit forces a wording that loses meaning.
Living in the market matters as much as speaking the language. A linguist who grew up in Bogotá but has spent twenty years in Barcelona will write beautiful Spanish that is quietly wrong for a Houston audience. Our localization work goes to linguists who are native in the target language and current in the target market, so idiom, references and register match what users read there today.
Every project gets a second bilingual reviewer before delivery, and glossary and memory files belong to you, not to us: if you change vendors, the assets go with you. Corporate buyers can see how we handle commercial work on our business translation services page, and studios and broadcasters on the media sector page.
Five steps from first file to shipped release, quoted the same business day.
Upload your string files, course exports or campaign copy through the quote form, with your target locales and deadline.
We reply within 60 minutes during business hours with a fixed price, a schedule and a recommended locale order.
Key terms, product names and tone decisions are agreed before translation starts, then reused on every future release.
Linguists who live in the target market translate the text. Code, placeholders and variables come back untouched.
Where a build or preview exists, a linguist checks the result on real screens. Files are delivered in the same formats you sent.
Localization is priced per source word, with engineering and review time quoted separately, so the shape of your quote follows the shape of your project. The main drivers, in rough order: total word count, the number of target locales, the subject matter (regulated and technical content costs more per word than plain interface copy), the rarity of the language pair, and how much context you supply.
Two things work in your favor. Short UI strings cost more per word than flowing text, since each one is checked in context, but there are usually fewer of them than clients expect. And repeated strings are reused through translation memory rather than charged again. As a guide, plan on per-word translation rates plus a separately quoted allowance for engineering, file preparation and in-context review; scope varies too much for one flat rate, and your quote confirms the exact price before any work starts.
In most cases the cheapest project is the well-prepared one. Clean string files and known character limits save more money than any rate negotiation.
Straight answers to the questions we hear most from US clients.
Send your string files and target locales. We reply within 60 minutes during business hours with a fixed quote and a sensible rollout plan.
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