Shopify makes it easy to sell internationally: Shopify Markets handles currencies, and translation apps localize your storefront. Support is often the part left behind. A shopper reads your product page in French, has a question about sizing, and meets a chat box that only works in English. This guide explains your live chat options on Shopify, how to add translated chat, and how to prepare for the questions each market asks.
Shopify's own free chat app is well integrated with orders and products and is a sensible starting point for a single-language store. Check its current feature set for multi-agent routing and translation if you serve many languages; these needs are where stores usually look for a dedicated tool.
Tools like Gorgias, Zendesk or Intercom add email, social and chat in one inbox, with deep order integrations. They're powerful and priced accordingly, typically per agent or per ticket. Translation may be an add-on or limited to AI answers.
A lighter option: a chat widget focused on live conversations and translation, installed with one snippet. This suits stores whose main problem is language, not ticket volume.
layout/theme.liquid.</body> tag and paste the snippet directly above it.Tips: duplicate your theme before editing so you can roll back; if you switch themes later, move the snippet to the new theme. Shopify's checkout is controlled by Shopify and generally doesn't load theme scripts, so chat appears on storefront, product and cart pages.
Pre-sale chat questions are surprisingly predictable. Prepare answers for these, by market:
| Topic | Typical question | Prepare |
|---|---|---|
| Shipping | "Do you ship to Chile? How long?" | Carrier, delivery range per region, tracking |
| Duties & taxes | "Will I pay customs fees?" | Whether prices include duties (DDP) or not (DDU) |
| Sizing | "I'm EU 39, which size?" | Size conversion table with cm measurements |
| Payment | "Can I pay with PIX / iDEAL / cash on delivery?" | Accepted payment methods per market |
| Returns | "Can I return it from Germany?" | Return window, who pays shipping, address |
| Authenticity & trust | "Is this original?" | Brand/warranty info, reviews link |
Write these as short, literal canned replies in one language. With two-way translation, each canned reply is delivered in the shopper's language automatically.
A store selling to Europe, the Americas and Asia gets questions around the clock. Practical options:
Track three numbers before and after enabling translated chat: conversion rate for chat users versus non-chat users, the share of chats in languages other than English, and first-response time. Many stores find non-English chats are a meaningful share of conversations once visitors can actually chat in their language.
ZhiDesk installs in theme.liquid with one snippet. The widget detects the shopper's language (Shopify sets the page lang attribute for each market language) and displays in one of 18 languages. Your agents reply in their own language and messages are translated both ways across 38 languages. Plans start at US$49/month for three agents with translation included; try it free for 7 days.
Yes, Shopify Inbox is Shopify's free chat app. Stores that need multi-agent routing or two-way translation across many languages often add a dedicated chat widget.
Paste the widget's script into layout/theme.liquid just above the closing body tag via Online Store, Themes, Edit code.
Some chat tools translate messages both ways in real time, so shoppers write in their language and agents reply in theirs. Check whether translation is included or billed per message.