hugo/docs/content/en/configuration/languages.md

title	linkTitle	description	categories	keywords
Configure languages	Languages	Configure the languages in your multilingual site.

Base settings

Configure the following base settings within the site's root configuration:

{{< code-toggle file=hugo >}} defaultContentLanguage = 'en' defaultContentLanguageInSubdir = false disableDefaultLanguageRedirect = false disableLanguages = [] {{< /code-toggle >}}

defaultContentLanguage

(string) The project's default language key, conforming to the syntax described in [RFC 5646]. This value must match one of the defined language keys. Default is en.

defaultContentLanguageInSubdir

(bool) Whether to publish the default language site to a subdirectory matching the defaultContentLanguage. Default is false.

disableDefaultLanguageRedirect

{{< new-in 0.140.0 />}}

(bool) Whether to disable generation of the alias redirect to the default language when DefaultContentLanguageInSubdir is true. Default is false.

disableLanguages

([]string]) A slice of language keys representing the languages to disable during the build process. Although this is functional, consider using the disabled key under each language instead.

Language settings

Configure each language under the languages key:

{{< code-toggle config=languages />}}

In the above, en is the language key.

disabled

(bool) Whether to disable this language when building the site. Default is false.

languageCode

(string) The language tag as described in [RFC 5646]. This value does not affect localization or URLs. Hugo uses this value to populate:

• The lang attribute of the html element in the [embedded alias template]
• The language element in the [embedded RSS template]
• The locale property in the [embedded OpenGraph template]

Access this value from a template using the Language.LanguageCode method on a Site or Page object.

languageDirection

(string) The language direction, either left-to-right (ltr) or right-to-left (rtl). Use this value in your templates with the global dir HTML attribute. Access this value from a template using the Language.LanguageDirection method on a Site or Page object.

languageName

(string) The language name, typically used when rendering a language switcher. Access this value from a template using the Language.LanguageName method on a Site or Page object.

title

(string) The site title for this language. Access this value from a template using the Title method on a Site object.

weight

(int) The language weight. When set to a non-zero value, this is the primary sort criteria for this language. Access this value from a template using the Language.Weight method on a Site or Page object.

Localized settings

Some configuration settings can be defined separately for each language. For example:

{{< code-toggle file=hugo >}} [languages.en] languageCode = 'en-US' languageName = 'English' weight = 1 title = 'Project Documentation' timeZone = 'America/New_York' [languages.en.pagination] path = 'page' [languages.en.params] subtitle = 'Reference, Tutorials, and Explanations' {{< /code-toggle >}}

The following configuration keys can be defined separately for each language:

{{< per-lang-config-keys >}}

Any key not defined in a languages object will fall back to the global value in the root of the site configuration.

Language keys

Language keys must conform to the syntax described in [RFC 5646]. For example:

{{< code-toggle file=hugo >}} defaultContentLanguage = 'de' [languages.de] weight = 1 [languages.en-US] weight = 2 [languages.pt-BR] weight = 3 {{< /code-toggle >}}

Artificial languages with private use subtags as defined in [RFC 5646 § 2.2.7] are also supported. Omit the art-x- prefix from the language key. For example:

{{< code-toggle file=hugo >}} defaultContentLanguage = 'en' [languages.en] weight = 1 [languages.hugolang] weight = 2 {{< /code-toggle >}}

[!note] Private use subtags must not exceed 8 alphanumeric characters.

Example

{{< code-toggle file=hugo >}} defaultContentLanguage = 'de' defaultContentLanguageInSubdir = true disableDefaultLanguageRedirect = false

[languages.de] contentDir = 'content/de' disabled = false languageCode = 'de-DE' languageDirection = 'ltr' languageName = 'Deutsch' title = 'Projekt Dokumentation' weight = 1

[languages.de.params] subtitle = 'Referenz, Tutorials und Erklärungen'

[languages.en] contentDir = 'content/en' disabled = false languageCode = 'en-US' languageDirection = 'ltr' languageName = 'English' title = 'Project Documentation' weight = 2

[languages.en.params] subtitle = 'Reference, Tutorials, and Explanations' {{< /code-toggle >}}

[!note] In the example above, omit contentDir if [translating by file name].

Multihost

Hugo supports multiple languages in a multihost configuration. This means you can configure a baseURL per language.

[!note] If you define a baseURL for one language, you must define a unique baseURL for all languages.

For example:

{{< code-toggle file=hugo >}} defaultContentLanguage = 'fr' [languages] [languages.en] baseURL = 'https://en.example.org/' languageName = 'English' title = 'In English' weight = 2 [languages.fr] baseURL = 'https://fr.example.org' languageName = 'Français' title = 'En Français' weight = 1 {{</ code-toggle >}}

With the above, Hugo publishes two sites, each with their own root:

public
├── en
└── fr

[embedded alias template]: {{% eturl alias %}} [embedded OpenGraph template]: {{% eturl opengraph %}} [embedded RSS template]: {{% eturl rss %}} [RFC 5646]: https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc5646#section-2.1 [RFC 5646 § 2.2.7]: https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc5646#section-2.2.7 [translating by file name]: /content-management/multilingual/#translation-by-file-name