If you searched for a way to translate your WordPress site, you probably landed on the same three names everyone lands on: WPML, the veteran; Weglot, the SaaS; and now Parly, the newcomer that takes a deliberately simpler path.
We build Parly, so you know where we stand. But this comparison is honest: all three tools are good at what they do, and the right choice depends on how your site is built, how much control you want over your content, and how much you are willing to pay every month. In some scenarios we will tell you, plainly, that Weglot or WPML is the better fit.
Three tools, three philosophies
The most useful way to compare them is not by feature checklists but by architecture, because everything else (price, SEO, lock-in) follows from it.
WPML is the traditional multilingual framework. It adds a translation layer inside WordPress: every post, taxonomy, string and widget gets registered in its system, and translations are managed through its own interface, with translator roles, translation memory and jobs. It is deep, powerful and correspondingly complex.
Weglot is an external translation service. It detects the content of your rendered pages, machine-translates it automatically on its servers, and serves the translated version under language subdomains or subdirectories. Setup takes minutes and covers everything on the page, including text hardcoded in your theme. Your translations, however, live in Weglot’s platform, not in your database.
Parly takes the simplest model WordPress allows: each translation is a normal WordPress page, duplicated from the original and edited with the editor you already use, whether that is Gutenberg, Classic, Elementor or another builder. No translation interface, no external service, no proxy. Your translations are regular posts in your own database.
Pricing: subscription, license or free
This is where the three diverge the most.
Weglot charges by word count and number of languages, as detailed on its pricing page. <cite index=”4-1″>Plans start around €15 per month and range up to €699 monthly, with word caps going from 10,000 words in one language to 5 million words in 20 languages</cite>. <cite index=”7-1″>The word allowance is a fixed total across all languages, not a monthly refill</cite>, so a content-heavy site in several languages climbs tiers quickly. For a blog that publishes regularly, translation costs grow with your content, forever.
WPML sells annual licenses. <cite index=”12-1″>Pricing starts at $29 for the Multilingual Blog plan and $79 for the Multilingual CMS plan, with cheaper renewal prices</cite>, and automatic translation consumes credits: <cite index=”13-1″>the CMS plan includes roughly 90,000 credits, and content beyond that requires buying more</cite>. Predictable for small sites, but machine translation at scale becomes its own line item.
Parly is free and open source, published on WordPress.org. There is no word count, no credit system and no premium tier. Bulk translation is done by exporting your content to a JSON file and translating it with the AI you already use (Claude, ChatGPT or any other), then importing it back. If you have an AI subscription, your marginal translation cost is zero.
SEO: all three can rank, in different ways
A translation that Google cannot index is wasted work, and here all three tools do the job properly, unlike JavaScript-only widgets.
WPML generates real translated pages with language URL structures like /en/ or subdomains, full hreflang support and integration with the major SEO plugins. It is the most configurable of the three.
Weglot, despite being an external service, serves translations server-side with dedicated URLs and automatic hreflang, so translated pages are indexable and can rank. <cite index=”7-1″>Translated URL slugs, though, only become available on higher plans</cite>.
Parly generates real WordPress pages with automatic hreflang (including x-default), correct lang attributes and fully translatable slugs, so /services/ can become /servicios/. One honest limitation: Parly does not create per-language URL prefixes. Each translation is a normal page with its own permalink, like /sobre-nos/ next to /about-us/, rather than /pt/sobre-nos/. If your SEO strategy specifically requires an /en/-style directory structure, WPML or Weglot serve that need better.
Content ownership and lock-in
Ask each tool one question: what happens to my translations if I stop using you?
With Weglot, translations live in their platform. Cancel the subscription and the translated versions of your site go with it. That is the nature of a SaaS proxy, not a flaw, but it is a dependency you should choose consciously.
With WPML, translations are stored in your database, but in WPML’s own table structures. Migrating away is possible and there are tools for it, but it is a project.
With Parly, translations are plain WordPress posts. Deactivate the plugin and every translated page stays published and reachable. There is nothing to export and nothing to migrate, because your content was never anywhere else.
Where each one wins
Choose Weglot if you want the whole site translated today with zero manual work, your theme has lots of hardcoded text you cannot edit, and a monthly subscription fits your budget. It is the fastest path from zero to a fully translated site, and for themes built almost entirely in PHP templates, its automatic approach reaches text that database-level plugins cannot.
Choose WPML if you run a large editorial operation with multiple translators, need translation management workflows, translation memory and per-language URL directories, and have the budget and patience for a heavier, more complex system.
Choose Parly if you want your translations to be real pages you own, edited with the editor you already know, with solid SEO out of the box and no recurring cost. It fits especially well if you already use an AI assistant: the AI bulk translation workflow, based on JSON export and import, turns a full-site translation into one review-and-publish session.
The short version
Weglot is a service you rent. WPML is a framework you license. Parly is a plugin that gets out of the way: it duplicates your pages, wires up the SEO and lets WordPress be WordPress.
If that sounds like your kind of tool, Parly is free on WordPress.org. Install it, register your languages and have your first translated page live in minutes. Any questions before you start? The FAQ on the Parly site covers the most common ones.
Parly is built by Sudo, a digital product studio from Brazil.