Hi Sofia!
Since my original post I’ve had experience with Weglot and with using 2 separate projects.
I also did a ton of research on these and the subfolder option back then.
I also worked with an SEO expert on that project and did some multilingual SEO research.
In a nutshell.
The general consensus is that subfolders are ok for small sites and 2 languages, even 3, and WeGlot is advised for larger sites with 2+ languages.
Below I go into more detail based on those experiences. Let me me know if you have any questions. I’m not often on the forums so I might be a few days to reply.
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Weglot
This is by far the quickest way to get set up. It takes care of SEO (see below) and automatically creates your 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc site.
Re: Your Translations: You can edit and replace WeGlot automatic translations with your own.
The main drawback: is you get some limitations on how much you can differentiate the experience in either language. This may or may not be a drawback depending on your site.
You don’t directly modify the 2nd language site. You always work on the main site, then WeGlot creates and translates the copy. There are some resources for you to assign what does and doesn’t get displayed in either language based on user browser settings, but you can’t modify anything for specific locations via WeGlot (you can via other apps, including foxy for eCommerce and localization platforms that integrate with Webflow).
Also keep in mind WeGlot’s pricing as it scales with the amount of content you need translated. At this point it doesn’t matter that you translate the content yourself, as WeGlot prices are not just for translating, but for handling all the setup, SEO, and translation interface.
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Subfolders:
Could get unwieldy depending on your site structure, but have the advantage of using up a single site plan, and one project and admin for controlling everything.
Static pages are very easy to set up. CMS items are a bit more work and you can find clever solutions here in the forums.
For SEO, you need to use hreflang tags on each page. As an example, this basically tells Google that Page A in English is equal to Page A in Spanish. Otherwise, Google will see the similar pages as duplicate content and penalize them. It’s not catastrophic if you don’t do it but it’s the best practice.
An additional benefit is that this helps you localize your sites, so that Google prioritizes one over the other in search results based on a user’s language preferences and even location. Example: you tag Page A for US English and another Page A for Australian English. Google will prioritize them accordingly in search results for users in the US and in Australia, or that are anywhere in the world but have a preferred form of English in their browsing settings.
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Separate projects
Works fine, and lets you use specific top level domains for local targeting and SEO benefits. For example, website.com is international and website.uk is aimed specifically at the UK.
You still need to use hreflang which can get impractical with CMS items.
If using different languages with the same top level domain, subdomains is a good idea. For example, something like site.com for your main language and de.site.com for the German version or fr.site.ca for Canadian french and en.site.ca for Canada in English.
Design and add a language switcher to both sites.
The drawback here is managing a second site.
So if you create a new page in one, you’ll have to migrate it to the other. Update in one, then update in the other. This is not bad and is only annoying when migrating CMS and in some cases, symbols get wonky (unbind them before copying if you spot any issues).
Any site expenses might double (like double hosting on Webflow). You can usually create a subdomain with your domain registrar at no extra cost though.
Cheers and welcome to the forums!