There are many things that can go awry in localisation testing, even if you prepare for the potential risks. As a rule of thumb, if something can go wrong, it almost certainly will. That’s why smooth team work and early bug detection plays an important role. Below you can find out how to plan the localisation testing to achieve good results and efficiency.

1. Choose the right team members

Localisation tests will only be as good as the tools you use and team members that you collaborate with. If you work with remote testers, ensure smooth communication and provide your team with detailed instructions. For localisation functionality tests, make sure the difference between a bug and weird feature of the product is clear to everyone. Sometimes the line between an error and unique feature can be very thin.

Examples of common localisation bugs: missing translation and wrong alignment.

2. Detect bugs as early as possible

The soonest the localisation bugs are detected, the easier it is to repair the code on time. To make sure that localisation errors can be uncovered promptly, the best idea is to work in the agile environment. In agile teams the product will be localised and tested in small chunks, so your testers won’t be overburdened and will be able to detect more issues. The tests will also proceed faster and smoother and it will be more likely to publish all language versions of the localised product simultaneously.

3. Test the high risk areas first

Quite often it is impossible to test everything, so the ability to prioritise will come in handy. Try to test the most difficult parts of the product first, such as strings with multiple variables. Pay special attention to placeholders in highly inflected languages, such as Polish, Arabic or Russian. Make sure the strings with placeholders will be grammatically correct for any possible combination. Another good idea is to start from features and functions that will be used frequently by your target users or items that display regularly in the localised product.

Localisation testing can be tricky and challenging, but proper risk management, good team work and the right testing order will help to overcome many tough issues and challenges.

What else do you think can make the localisation testing smoother and easier?

Dorota Pawlak

Dorota helps digital brands infuse their content with a local touch. She is a localization consultant, translator specialized in IT, prompt engineer, and a book author. Dorota teaches online courses on localization, writes for her blog and a Medium publication. She also runs a Small Biz AI, a Substack newsletter for freelancers and small business owners ready to discover handy AI tools.