Building Forms
Language setting
Choose the source language for a form, decide how respondents land in a language, and understand how locale fallback works.
Source language
Set the source language under Form language in Form settings → General. This is the language you author the form in and the fallback respondents see when no published translation matches.
Source language controls formbase’s built-in respondent UI: buttons, validation messages, progress text, default success messages, default respondent emails, date/time formatting, and number formatting.
Source language is not translation
Changing source language localizes built-in UI. It does not rewrite your question labels, help text, options, content blocks, custom thank-you pages, or custom emails. Use Translating form content for custom content.
Supported languages
formbase offers 65 languages, and the built-in respondent UI is translated into every one of them. The list runs from Afrikaans, Amharic,
Arabic, Bengali, Bulgarian, Burmese, Catalan, Croatian, Czech and Danish through to Ukrainian, Urdu, Uzbek, Vietnamese, Chinese
(Simplified) and Chinese (Traditional), and it includes the regional variants en-GB, es-MX, fr-CA
and pt-BR. The picker in Form settings → General is searchable — type a name or a code to find one.
Respondent language
Respondents see the source language unless the form has published translations. Once at least one translation is published, formbase resolves the content language in this order, highest priority first:
- 1
Previous picker selection
If the respondent picked a language on this form before, formbase remembers it in that browser.
- 2
URL language parameter
Add ?lang=fr or another published code to send a localized link.
- 3
Share-link language
Pin a share link to a default language while still letting respondents switch.
- 4
Browser preferences
formbase matches the browser's preferred languages against the published translations.
- 5
Source language
If nothing else matches, the form opens in the source language.
The language screen
A respondent who arrives with none of the first three — no stored pick, no ?lang=, no share-link default — sees
“Pick your language to start” before the questions, whatever their browser prefers. That screen is skipped as soon as
one of the three is present, which is why a share-link default or a ?lang= link is the shortest path for a campaign.
Localized links
Use ?lang= when you want to send people directly to one language. For example, send French respondents a link ending in
?lang=fr. If the requested language is not published, formbase falls back to the normal resolution order.
Share-link defaults are useful when one campaign, QR code, embed, or partner link should open in a specific language without forcing that language forever. Respondents can still switch if more published languages are available.
Right-to-left layout
Respondent forms and generated PDFs lay out right-to-left when the active language is written that way — Arabic, Hebrew, Persian, Urdu, and the other RTL scripts in the list. Direction follows the active respondent language, so one form can serve both directions.
What language affects
| Area | Behavior |
|---|---|
| Built-in form UI | Buttons, validation, progress text, default messages, and common respondent-facing UI follow the active language. |
| Custom form content | Questions, options, paragraphs, and custom thank-you content use source text unless a published translation exists. |
| Respondent emails | Default email templates localize by language; custom email copy needs translated subject/body rows. |
| PDFs | Attached and downloaded PDFs render labels and page content in the respondent language when a translation bundle exists. |
Language setup tips
- Pick the source language before writing lots of copy; source text becomes the baseline for translation status.
Pick a regional variant when wording or tone differs by market. Four are available:
en-GB,es-MX,fr-CA, andpt-BR.Preview localized links before sending campaigns: open the public form with
?lang=xx.- Submit one test response per important language when emails or attached PDFs are enabled.