One thing I’m asked often when developing Shopify stores is:
How can I change the text on the checkout page?
Some clients want to include specific wording; others want to mention currency; some want something else.
Shopify’s official answer is that the checkout page can’t really be modified. But they also recommend a sneaky way of getting around the ‘you-no-customise-the-checkout-page’ rule: translations.
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Officially, translations are meant for exactly that: translating between languages. (By the way – we speak Spanish, German, Japanese and French, so any multilingual questions are welcome!). However, the translations function can also be used to change the hard-coded wording in various areas of your shop. Here’s a recent example.
Craig’s Milspec.tv store requires display in multiple currencies. We wanted to show a message saying “Your order will be processed in US Dollars, but you’ll pay in your local currency. Don’t worry”. Or something to that effect.
Shopify’s checkout page text is usually locked to this:
Create your order.
By creating a custom translation, we were able to change it to:
Your order will be processed in US Dollars.
This avoids any nasty backlash from unsuspecting customers seeing USD on checkout when they were seeing the store in other currencies. In short, it’s honest.
How to edit your checkout page
1. Go to Preferences > General >
2. Under “Adjust your standards and formats”, choose “Checkout Language”, and hit “Inspect”. This will get you to a translation screen.
3. Give your translation a name. You might call this the name of your shop (in my case: Eco Gadget Covers).
4. Scroll down to the piece of text you want to change. In this example, let’s change “Create your order”. Type in the text (‘translation’) that you want to appear on your cart page.
5. Scroll to the bottom and hit “Use this for my checkout language”.
That’s it. You’ll now see that appear on your checkout page.
Another final tip: Your “cart” page is another good place to add information about shipping, taxes, and currencies. You can edit that via Theme > Theme Editor > Cart.liquid.
Want this on your store? Reach us here.
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Once again, thank you for showing interest in our Shopify Insider Blog @ Blackbelt Commerce. Please make sure to check out our products and great services.
Additionally, we also have some top blog recommendations for you to check out; The Easy Upsell, Shopify’s responsive checkout, How to reduce shopify abandonment cart in shopify plus, How much does it cost to hire a shopify expert?, and How To Back Up Your Shopify Store. As always, keep a lookout for new blog posts.
Furthermore, if you have any questions feel free to comment below.
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Looks like this is out of date – the setting isn’t where you say it should be.
Hey there Chris. You’re right! This post was written during the previous version of the Shopify backend, called Shopify 1. They’ve now switched to Shopify 2 which looks different. I’ve updated it above to reflect the new version. Enjoy!
Tristan, bomb work around, I’ve been trying to change the checkout text to match our brand for so long. Much thanks!
Hey Chris, glad you liked it 🙂
Hi Tristan,
I’ve created a couple of new checkout language but I don’t find any option to update them. I can delete it, view details, but impossible to reach input list again for some update.
Do I have to create another new language from the beginning each time I want to translate a new field ?
Sounds pretty annoying …
Hi Yann,
If you created the new Checkout Language yourself, there should be an “Edit” button. Are you sure there isn’t? One other thing to check — perhaps you’re logged in with a different ID? What I mean is — sometimes for example I create a store with a master admin. Then, I create a login for my team. If I created the checkout langauge with the master admin, then log in with the team (non-master) admin, I can’t edit.
In other words: You will only be able to edit the translation with the ID you used to create it. Could you double check both of those? Hope it helps!
Hi Tristan
I would like to swap around the adresses boxes on checkout (billing address and shipping address) and delete one of them also. Do you have any idea where I can do this. I have tried EVERYTHING it seems…..
Oh and thanks for this post – it helped me too 😉
Mette
Hi Mette,
Glad you liked the post 🙂
You can’t physically switch those boxes — the checkout fields in Shopify can’t be changed / edited (only the formatting). However, you could change the text so that it appears the way you want it to.
Try going to Admin > Settings > Checkout > Checkout Language. Create your own. Then cahnge “Billing Address” to “Shipping Address” and vice-versa. You can’t delete one, but you can check the box so that Shipping Address doesn’t get shown (only Billing), like in this article: https://docs.shopify.com/manual/settings/checkout/same-shipping
Hope that helps!
THANK YOU! I have been trying to adjust one word for hours! 🙂
Glad it helped 🙂
PS. This work on the current version of Shopify (Nov. 2014)!!! You have to activate an alternate language and just change what you want to change. Leave all the rest as English and it won’t mess up the website. Looks amazing!
This is a handy tip, thanks – but I just wanted to ask about something else you said: “Craig’s Milspec.tv store requires display in multiple currencies. We wanted to show a message saying “Your order will be processed in US Dollars, but you’ll pay in your local currency. Don’t worry”. Or something to that effect.” How did you get the payment to happen in local currency, when the order would be processed in your theme’s default currency (US Dollars)? Does it depend on the payment gateway?
Hey Chris, glad to clarify. What we actually meant with this was: They would be *charged* in their local currency, e.g. by PayPal.
You can only accept payments in *one* currency on Shopify, e.g. USD. But the payment gateway (e.g. Stripe or PayPal) will charge them and do the conversion. Hope that helps!
Thank you so much for this article. I was wondering if it is possible to update the default “confirmation email sent text” to something of my choosing, which includes an hyperlink? I am wondering if is possible to add a quick promotional line there, that links to our site, in the appropriate manner? Thanks in advance!
Hi there! Yes, sure, you can update the confirmation emails to add a hyperlink if you use the HTML version. This should help: https://docs.shopify.com/manual/sell-online/notifications/order-notifications
Hi Tristan,
I bought the shopify ninja multilanguage theme. The translation works on all pages except on the checkout page. I can’t find a way to make it work. Can you help me?
Hi Paul,
Thanks for your email and for picking up our theme. The Checkout Text can’t be modified in the same way as page content, due to Shopify limitations. But we do have some suggestions for that! Please see “Step 4: Checkout Text” on this page – https://bilingual-coffee-theme.myshopify.com/pages/bilingual-theme-setup
Hope that helps, just let me know if you have any other questions.
Thanks,
Tristan.