Ensuring your WordPress site supports right-to-left (RTL) languages is essential for providing a seamless user experience to speakers of Arabic, Hebrew, Persian, Urdu, and other RTL languages. Without proper support, your site may appear misaligned, making navigation and readability difficult for users.
This step-by-step guide will show you how to add RTL support in WordPress efficiently, whether you are using a ready-made theme or developing a custom one.
Understanding RTL in WordPress
WordPress has built-in support for RTL languages, but themes and plugins must explicitly accommodate RTL layouts. RTL implementation primarily involves:
- Themes: Ensuring your theme supports RTL formatting.
- CSS styling: Writing styles that mirror the default layout for RTL users.
- Plugins: Verifying that all plugins function properly in an RTL environment.
- Content alignment: Ensuring that text, images, and UI elements are correctly displayed.
To ensure you’re creating a seamless browsing experience for RTL users, there are some best practices you should follow. So, let’s go over how to review your themes and plugins for RTL compatibility, adding that compatibility if necessary, and how to test and maintain your site’s RTL support.
How to check your theme’s RTL compatibility
Before making any changes, check if your theme already supports RTL. Many premium and well-maintained free themes include built-in RTL support.
1. Review the theme documentation
Most theme developers specify whether their theme supports RTL in the documentation. Check the theme’s website or WordPress.org plugin repository listing.
2. Look for an RTL stylesheet
Themes that support RTL generally include an rtl.css file in their directory. To check:
- Navigate to Appearance → Theme Editor in the WordPress dashboard.
- Look for an rtl.css file in the theme’s root folder.
If the file exists, the theme likely supports RTL. If not, you’ll need to create one manually.
3. Test with an RTL language
To switch your site’s language:
- Go to Settings → General.
- Scroll to the Site Language option.
- Select an RTL language like Arabic or Hebrew.
- Save changes and check your site’s layout.
If the theme doesn’t automatically adjust, you’ll need to add RTL support manually.
How to add RTL support to your WordPress theme
1. Set up a child theme
Before making modifications, create a child theme to ensure your changes are preserved when updating the parent theme. To set up a child theme:
- Create a new folder in wp-content/themes/, naming it yourtheme-child.
- Inside this folder, create a style.css file and add the following header:
/*
Theme Name: YourTheme Child
Template: yourtheme
*/- Create a functions.php file inside the child theme folder and enqueue the parent theme’s styles:
<?php
function child_theme_enqueue_styles() {
wp_enqueue_style('parent-style', get_template_directory_uri() . '/style.css');
}
add_action('wp_enqueue_scripts', 'child_theme_enqueue_styles');
?>Activate the child theme from the WordPress dashboard under Appearance → Themes.
2. Create an RTL stylesheet
To create an RTL version of your theme’s styles:
- Duplicate style.css: Copy your theme’s main style.css file and rename the copy rtl.css.
- Modify CSS properties: Adjust elements that need to be reversed for RTL, such as margins, padding, and text alignment. For example:
body {
direction: rtl;
unicode-bidi: embed;
}
.text-align-left {
text-align: right;
}
.margin-left-20 {
margin-right: 20px;
margin-left: 0;
}- Use CSS logical properties: Instead of writing separate rules for LTR and RTL, use logical properties such as margin-inline-start and margin-inline-end. Logical properties apply styles relative to flow direction instead of left, right, top, and bottom.
3. Enqueue the RTL stylesheet
To ensure WordPress loads rtl.css when an RTL language is active, add this function to your functions.php file:
function enqueue_rtl_styles() {
if (is_rtl()) {
wp_enqueue_style('rtl-styles', get_template_directory_uri() . '/rtl.css');
}
}
add_action('wp_enqueue_scripts', 'enqueue_rtl_styles');This ensures that WordPress loads the RTL stylesheet only when necessary.
4. Adjust text alignment and positioning
Check your site for elements that need adjustments:
- Menus: Ensure navigation menus are correctly aligned.
- Icons and images: Flip directional icons where necessary.
- Buttons and forms: Ensure correct positioning of form fields and buttons.
You may need to use the transform: scaleX(-1); property to flip images/icons dynamically.
Ensuring plugin compatibility
Many WordPress plugins work with RTL, but some may require additional configuration.
1. Check plugin documentation
Visit the plugin’s official WordPress page or developer website to check for RTL support. Some plugins include built-in RTL styling, while others do not.
2. Modify plugin styles manually
If a plugin does not support RTL, you can override its styles using custom CSS in your rtl.css file. For example:
function enqueue_rtl_styles() {
if (is_rtl()) {
wp_enqueue_style('rtl-styles', get_template_directory_uri() . '/rtl.css');
}
}
add_action('wp_enqueue_scripts', 'enqueue_rtl_styles');Alternatively, use a plugin like Simple Custom CSS and JS to add custom styles without modifying your theme or child theme files. Do not modify your plugin’s core files as any changes you make will be overwritten when you update your plugin.
Translating your site’s content
To ensure a fully localized experience, translate your site’s content, menus, theme strings, and plugin strings into the target RTL language. Doing this manually can be very tedious and cost-prohibitive so the best approach, especially if you want to translate your site into many different languages, is to use a plugin or other software that can assist in translation.
There are a few different tools you can use and you may need to use a combination of tools to translate content in addition to theme and plugin strings.
Tools for translating content
There are some translation plugins that offer a free tier, but if you have advanced translation needs you may need to upgrade to a paid tier. These “freemium” plugins include:
- Jetpack AI Assistant: A powerful tool that enables you to create, optimize, and translate content (including RTL content) using AI.
- Polylang: A free and popular translation tool with good RTL support, but you will need to provide your own translations. Polylang does not provide machine translation.
- Translate WordPress with GTranslate: This plugin uses the Google Translate engine to offer machine translation of your website.
Tools for translating theme and plugin strings
There are a couple popular free tools you can use for translating theme and plugin strings.
- Loco Translate: This plugin lets you modify .po and .mo language files directly within the WordPress dashboard for theme and plugin string translation. It offers automatic translation and integration with GTranslate, DeepL, Microsoft AI, and Lecto AI. Loco Translate is ideal for non-technical users who need a simple way to localize their WordPress sites.
- Poedit: If you don’t want to add another plugin to your WordPress site, you can use this desktop software to manage your theme and plugin string translations. It’s available for Mac, Windows, and Linux and you can use it to import your POT file and export as .po and .mo language files which you can then upload to your website.
Testing your RTL implementation
To ensure a smooth user experience, conduct thorough testing across different screen sizes and browsers. If possible, get feedback from native speakers of RTL languages.
1. Check responsiveness
Test your site across different screen sizes to ensure that RTL elements adjust correctly. You can use responsive design mode within your browser’s developer console or you can use a free online tool like Viewport Resizer to check your site’s display.
2. Perform cross-browser testing
Different browsers may handle your RTL display differently, so check your site on the most popular browsers, including:
- Google Chrome
- Safari
- Microsoft Edge
- Mozilla Firefox
- Samsung Internet
3. Get feedback from native RTL speakers
Feedback on your site’s translation, readability, and usability from native speakers of RTL languages like Arabic, Hebrew, or Persian can help you identify any inconsistencies. If you don’t know someone personally who can help, you can reach out to a professional translation service or look for translators on platforms like Upwork.
Maintaining RTL support over time
Adding RTL support is not a one-time process. You must maintain it with regular updates, reviews of your site’s appearance, and staying up-to-date on the latest best practices.
Enable automatic updates
Developers frequently improve RTL support in updates, so always keep WordPress, your theme, and all plugins current. Enabling automatic updates will ensure that most things get updated as soon as a new version is available, but there may be plugins you use that aren’t able to be updated automatically. Create a schedule to check for any updates that need to be made manually.
Recheck RTL styling after updates
Whenever you update your theme or plugins, review your site to ensure that RTL functionality remains intact. Visual regression testing can help with some of this and you can use free plugins like VRTs – Visual Regression Tests or WP Boom to test for any layout shifts after plugin updates. Keep in mind VRT tools aren’t perfect, so you may still want to review pages individually to ensure that nothing is missed.
Follow WordPress community discussions
Read the latest WordPress development news over at Make WordPress and join other WordPress forums and communities to stay informed about best practices for RTL support.
Streamline RTL content creation and translation with Jetpack AI Assistant
Manually translating content and ensuring proper RTL formatting can be time-consuming. This is where Jetpack AI Assistant can simplify the process. Jetpack AI Assistant, a powerful AI-powered content creation plugin for WordPress, helps generate and translate content effortlessly, including into RTL languages.
How Jetpack AI Assistant enhances RTL content creation:
- Automated translation: Quickly translate your posts, pages, and custom content into RTL languages while maintaining proper sentence structure and readability.
- Content generation: Helps create high-quality, SEO-friendly content optimized for multilingual audiences, saving time and effort.
- Seamless integration: Works directly within the WordPress editor, providing a smooth and efficient workflow.
By leveraging Jetpack AI Assistant, you can efficiently manage multilingual content and provide a better user experience for RTL users without extensive manual effort. Whether you’re creating new content or translating existing material, Jetpack AI Assistant makes the process faster and more accurate.
To explore how Jetpack AI Assistant can improve your site’s content strategy, visit Jetpack AI Assistant.
Frequently asked questions
Does WordPress support RTL languages out of the box?
Yes, WordPress is ready to support languages that read from right to left. When you choose an RTL language like Arabic or Hebrew in your WordPress settings, the admin dashboard will automatically switch its layout.
For your website’s public pages to look correct, your WordPress theme needs a special file called rtl.css. This file tells the theme how to arrange everything for RTL readers. If your theme includes this file, the change will happen on its own, giving your visitors a good experience.
What are the most common mistakes when implementing RTL in WordPress?
The most frequent error is not creating or properly setting up the rtl.css stylesheet. Without it, your theme will not know how to flip the layout correctly. Another common issue is using CSS styles that do not work well with RTL layouts, such as fixed positions that look out of place.
Many people also forget to test the site with someone who actually speaks the language. This can lead to a site that looks right technically but feels unnatural to native speakers, who might notice small details that are wrong.
How do I test my WordPress site for proper RTL compatibility?
The best way to test is to ask a native speaker of the RTL language to use your site. They will spot issues with context and flow that you might miss. You can also perform technical checks yourself.
Go to your WordPress settings and change the site language to an RTL language. Then, browse your website and look for any visual problems. Pay close attention to your main menu, sidebars, contact forms, and any special page elements. Use your browser’s developer tools to inspect parts that seem broken.
Will changing my WordPress site to RTL break my existing theme or plugins?
It is possible that changing to an RTL layout could cause problems, but this is less likely with high-quality themes and plugins. Themes that are described as “translation-ready” are built to handle such changes.
Issues usually happen when a theme or plugin has its styles hard-coded and does not follow WordPress best practices. This can make parts of your site look messy or out of order. To be safe, you should always test the RTL switch on a separate staging site first before applying it to your live website.
What is an rtl.css file and why is it important for WordPress?
An rtl.css file is a special stylesheet that holds the CSS rules needed to make a WordPress theme display correctly for right-to-left languages. WordPress is smart enough to look for this specific file.
If it exists in your theme’s folder and the site is set to an RTL language, WordPress will load it automatically. This file contains rules that override the theme’s default left-to-right styles. For example, it will contain CSS to make the sidebar appear on the right side of the page instead of the left.
Can I use a plugin to add RTL support instead of coding it myself?
Yes, you can use a plugin to manage RTL support, which is often easier if you are not a developer. Plugins like WPML or Polylang are made to help you create a multilingual website. They can handle switching to RTL layouts for you.
These tools will manage your translations and make sure the correct stylesheets are loaded for each language. This is a very practical solution for business owners who want to serve customers in different regions without needing to write any code themselves.
How does RTL support affect my website’s SEO?
Adding proper RTL support is very good for your website’s SEO. It allows you to connect with a whole new audience that speaks RTL languages. When you offer a version of your site for these users, you create a better experience for them.
Google recognizes this and may rank your pages higher for searches made in those languages. To get the full SEO benefit, you should also use hreflang tags. These are small code snippets that tell search engines which language and country each version of your page is for.
Do all WordPress themes support RTL correctly?
No, not all WordPress themes are built to support RTL languages perfectly from the start. Many new, popular themes are made with RTL in mind because their creators know it is important.
However, some older themes or themes that were not coded carefully might be missing the required rtl.css file. They might also have style rules that cause layout problems in an RTL format. Before you choose a theme, you should always check its features list or documentation to see if “RTL support” is mentioned.
What is the difference between localization (l10n) and internationalization (i18n)?
Internationalization is the first step. It means building your theme or plugin in a way that makes it easy to translate into other languages later. It is about preparing your code for future translations. Localization is the second step. It is the actual process of translating your prepared code into a specific language, like Arabic or Spanish.
So, internationalization is about making your code ready for any language, and localization is about adapting it for one particular language. You need to do the first step to be able to do the second one.
How do I handle images and media in an RTL layout?
Images themselves do not need to be flipped, but their placement on the page often does. For example, if you have an image that is aligned to the left side of a paragraph, you will need to change its alignment to the right side in your rtl.css file.
Also, if an image contains text, that text will need to be translated. This may require you to create a separate version of the image for your RTL language pages. It is a good practice to think about how your images and text work together in both layout directions.
Jetpack 