Sitecore Integration

Overview

The Smartcat–Sitecore integration translates Sitecore pages and asset metadata directly within the Sitecore CMS, keeping structured content, components, and metadata accurately localized while preserving page hierarchy and field integrity across language versions.

Key capabilities:

• Translation of pages, structured content, and asset metadata (SEO fields, tags, descriptions)

• An update flow that detects source changes and translates only modified fields or segments instead of reprocessing entire pages

• Field-level translation control, so you include or exclude specific fields from the translation scope

• Automatic copying of selected source fields (serial numbers, SKUs, links, technical codes) to target language versions without translation

Prerequisites

Smartcat side:

• A Smartcat account with API access

• A Smartcat API key and account ID (generated in Settings → API)

Sitecore side:

• A supported Sitecore version (connector packages are provided for Sitecore 10.1, 10.2, 10.3, and 10.4)

• Access to the Sitecore Desktop, Development Tools, and the Installation Wizard

• Permission to install packages and restart the Sitecore client

How to connect

Install the plugin

1. Download the connector zip archive that matches your Sitecore version (10.1, 10.2, 10.3, or 10.4)

2. At the Launchpad, go to Control Panel → Desktop

   

3. Open Development Tools → Installation Wizard

   

4. Click Upload package

   

5. Add the Smartcat plugin zip archive

   

6. Select Override existing files and upload the plugin

   

   

7. Choose the uploaded package and click Next

   

8. Click Install to install the plugin

   

9. Restart the Sitecore client when prompted

The Smartcat tab appears in the Content Editor, confirming the plugin is installed.

Connect to Smartcat

1. In Smartcat, go to Settings → API and click Create New Key. Copy the API key and your account ID

   

2. In the Sitecore Content Editor, open the Smartcat tab and click Connect workspace

3. Paste your account ID and API key, then confirm

The plugin is connected to your Smartcat workspace and ready to translate.

Core workflow

Translating pages

1. Ensure your Sitecore instance has multiple languages enabled. Verify that several languages have been added under System → Languages in Sitecore.

2. On the Smartcat tab, click Create project

   

3. Select one or several items for translation

   

4. Configure the translation scope

To exclude specific fields, select the field to exclude from the template associated with the page you want to translate.

If a page has linked items, for example, a banner stored as a separate item in Core, select Include Linked Items to add them to the translation scope automatically. If a linked item has its own linked items, specify how deep the plugin should go into the inheritance structure.

1. Set up target languages. Smartcat uses Sitecore's default system language as the source language

💡 You can set up custom locale mappings to align your Sitecore locales with Smartcat locales (see Configuration options)

1. Specify the translation project details:

2. Translation project title

3. Project deadline (optional)

4. Translation workflow — the default Smartcat workflow or a custom one

5. (Optional) Import existing translations for these locales into Smartcat

   

6. Confirm project creation

   

7. On the Smartcat tab, click View projects. Select the project and click the pencil icon to open it in Smartcat, or open the Smartcat dashboard and navigate to the project directly. Complete the translations in Smartcat

   

   

8. To complete the review process, click Done to confirm all segments in the CAT editor, then return to Sitecore.

9. Pull the translations back to Sitecore. You can pull for a specific language version, a selected translation project, or all translation projects

When a page's translation is pulled, Smartcat creates a new page version in that language in Sitecore. Fields excluded from the translation scope keep their source value. Complex items such as images and links with their own text fields (alt text, descriptions) are extracted and sent to Smartcat automatically.

Your Sitecore pages are translated and the language versions are available in the CMS.

Updating translations

When source content changes, you can target the translation to the parts that changed, instead of retranslating from scratch.

1. Send an item for translation in Smartcat for the first time. If it is fully or partly translated, include the existing translations

2. Update the source content of the item

   

3. Send it for translation again by creating a translation project. You can select several pages at once, whether or not they were previously translated

⚠️ Do not include existing translations this time

Additional settings

Custom language mapping

Sitecore allows you to create highly custom locales and dialects and Smartcat may not have a fully matching option. The list of languages and dialects supported by Smartcat is available here.

In some cases you may also want to treat one of your Sitecore languages differently. For example, Spanish with the "es" locale might actually be Spanish (LATAM) when it comes to translation.

For both cases, Smartcat allows you to create custom locale mappings, essentially telling Smartcat to use a certain locale when translating from another locale in Sitecore.

To do this, in Sitecore, open System → Settings → Smartcat → SmartcatSettings and edit the LocaleMap field. The format is: %locale in Sitecore% <> %locale in Smartcat%. Each entry should be on a new line.

Copying values from source to language copies

In some cases, field values should be the same across all languages.

In this case, you can either use the shared setting for this field in the item template, or configure the Smartcat plugin to copy the field value from the source to the language version when creating one using the plugin.

To do this, open the Smartcat tab and click Plugin Settings. Next, select the template and the field that should be copied. The setting will be applied to all items created using this template.

Emulating Sitecore item path in Smartcat

When a translation project is created in Smartcat, each translatable item is represented as a file. Optionally, you can configure Smartcat to mirror the item path from Sitecore inside Smartcat. This can be useful when you want to see the exact item path while working in the Smartcat Editor.

Understanding "Copy field value" vs. "Do not copy field value"

The Plugin Settings panel displays two sections: Copy field value and Do not copy field value. These are two opposite modes of the same setting.

Copy field value acts as a whitelist: the plugin copies only the selected fields to the target language version.

Do not copy field value acts as a blacklist: the plugin copies everything except the selected fields.

Only one mode is active at a time. The selected field list is shared between both modes: a field you add appears under both sections because the list is retained regardless of which mode is currently active. Your selection is not lost when you switch modes. Only the active mode takes effect when a project is created.

📌 This setting is plugin-wide and applies to all projects created from the selected template, not to individual projects.