Lang Forge vs Weglot — Self-Hosted WordPress Alternative

Weglot is a popular translation tool that bills itself as “the easiest way to translate your website.” It is easy. It’s also SaaS — your translated content lives on Weglot’s servers, not yours — and it’s priced per-word, which means it gets expensive fast.

Lang Forge is a self-hosted alternative. Your translations live in your own WordPress database. You pay a flat annual fee. AI translation is included. And you never have to pick between “spend more on Weglot” and “hide translations from Google.”

TL;DR comparison

The SaaS vs self-hosted question

This is the real decision when comparing Lang Forge and Weglot.

Weglot is SaaS

Weglot hosts your translations. When a visitor loads a translated page, the content is either proxied through Weglot’s CDN or fetched on the fly from Weglot’s API. That’s what makes Weglot’s setup so fast — you install a small plugin, Weglot auto-detects your content, and translations just appear. But the tradeoff is real:

• You don’t own the translations. They live in Weglot’s database. If you ever want to leave, export options are limited.
• You depend on Weglot’s uptime. If Weglot’s API is slow or down, your translated pages are slow or down.
• You pay by word count. Weglot’s pricing is tiered by the number of words you translate, per language. As your content grows, your Weglot bill grows.
• Data sovereignty is Weglot’s problem. For some industries and some jurisdictions, sending user-facing content through a third-party SaaS is a compliance issue.

Lang Forge is self-hosted

Lang Forge is a regular WordPress plugin. Your translations live in your own database, in your own wp_posts and wp_postmeta tables (plus Lang Forge’s own tables). When a visitor loads a translated page, WordPress serves it the same way it serves any other page — no external API call, no proxy, no cloud dependency.

• You own your data. Every translation is in your database. You can back it up, query it, export it, or walk away at any time.
• No external dependency. Translated pages load without any API call (AI translation requests are only made when you’re creating translations, not when visitors view them).
• Flat pricing. $54, $114, or $174 per year regardless of how many words you translate.
• Full GDPR control. The only data that ever leaves your server is the AI translation request itself — and we don’t log prompt content.

Pricing math

Weglot’s cheapest paid plan (Starter) is around $190 per year for a single language and 10,000 words. If you want five languages, you need at least the Business plan at ~$600/year. Beyond 200,000 words, you’re on Advanced at $1,900/year or Extended at $4,000+. Large e-commerce stores can easily spend tens of thousands per year.

Lang Forge is $54 for one site and $174 for unlimited sites. No matter how many words, how many languages, or how many posts. The most expensive Lang Forge plan is $174/year.

For any site with more than a couple of thousand translatable words, Lang Forge is dramatically cheaper than Weglot. The gap widens the larger your site gets.

AI translation: both have it, one is included

Weglot includes AI translation in all paid plans (using various providers depending on the language pair). The quality is good. But you’re still paying per word, and AI translations count against your word count quota. Run out of quota and you pay for an upgrade.

Lang Forge includes AI translation with every paid plan: a one-time 100-credit bonus at first activation, plus pay-as-you-go packs that never expire ($3 for 250 credits, $9 for 1,000, $35 for 5,000, $149 for 25,000). No monthly cap, no per-word surcharge — you pay only for what you use.

Performance: cloud proxy vs native WordPress

Weglot’s performance depends on its CDN. For most sites on most pages, it’s fast. But any issue in Weglot’s network affects your pages’ load time. And you have limited ability to debug or optimize what’s happening on their side.

Lang Forge renders translated pages entirely through WordPress — no external call, no network hop. If your site is fast in English, it’s fast in German. If it’s slow, you can profile it and fix it the same way you’d fix any WordPress performance issue.

Lang Forge also uses an in-memory cache for translation lookups and a preload_translations() batch method that eliminates N+1 SQL queries on the frontend. For large multilingual sites, the performance delta vs. a SaaS proxy is noticeable.

Migrating from Weglot to Lang Forge

Weglot doesn’t offer a clean export of translations in a format other WordPress plugins can read. The recommended migration path is:

1. Install Lang Forge
2. Configure your target languages
3. Run wp langforge translate --all --ai to regenerate translations with AI — typically this costs a single-digit dollar amount in credits, far less than a single month of Weglot fees
4. Review AI translations in the visual editor
5. Disable Weglot

For agencies managing multiple client sites, this is usually the fastest and cleanest path.

Frequently asked questions

Does Lang Forge work offline?

For end users viewing translated pages, yes — no external API call is needed. For AI translation of new content, yes — requests go to our managed backend, but if your server is offline you can still view all existing translations.

Is the pricing really flat?

Yes. $54, $114, or $174 per year. No word count limits, no language limits, no per-site tax beyond the plan’s site count.

Will AI credits run out?

Every license includes a one-time 100-credit bonus at first activation (roughly 20 average blog posts). When you need more, pay-as-you-go packs never expire: $3 for 250 credits, $9 for 1,000, $35 for 5,000, $149 for 25,000. Buy only what you need, whenever you need it.

Can I export translations if I want to leave?

Yes. Lang Forge supports XLIFF 1.2 and CSV export for all content. Your data is yours.

Ready to move off Weglot?

Get Lang Forge — from $54/year →

14-day refund. Self-hosted. Flat pricing. Data ownership.