Translating Recipe Kit Filter Addon

Translating Filter Options

The Recipe Kit Filter addon lets visitors filter blog posts by tags — for example, by diet type, meal category, or cuisine. With automatic translations enabled, the filter dropdown labels can be translated into every language your store supports, while still navigating to the correct tagged page.


This guide covers how filter translations work and how to manage them in Translate & Adapt.


Before You Start

This article assumes you've already completed the one-time setup. If you haven't:



How Filter Translations Work

Blog article tags in Shopify are not translatable — they're always stored in your source language. This creates a problem: if a visitor switches to German and sees a filter option translated to "Schnelle Rezepte," clicking it tries to find articles tagged with that German text, which don't exist.


Recipe Kit solves this by separating the display label (what the visitor sees) from the navigation value (the original tag used in the URL). When a visitor selects a translated filter option, they see the label in their language but the filter navigates using the original source-language tag.


What Gets Translated

Each filter block stores its translatable content in a RecipeKit Filter metaobject. The translatable fields are:


  • Filter group names — the label shown before the dropdown (e.g., "Diet", "Category", "Cuisine")
  • Filter tag options — each individual tag displayed in the dropdown (e.g., "Vegan", "Keto", "Easy Dessert")
  • "All" label — the default dropdown text (defaults to "All")
  • "Cancel Filter" label — the button that clears all active filters (defaults to "Cancel Filter")

Setting Up Filter Translations

Filter metaobjects are created automatically when you edit your filter block settings in the theme editor:


  1. Open your theme in the Theme Editor
  2. Navigate to a blog template page that has the Recipe Kit Filter block
  3. Click on the filter block to view its settings
  4. Make any change (or just re-save) — this triggers a sync to Shopify
  5. Wait about 2 seconds — the filter metaobject is created or updated in the background

You only need to do this once per filter block. After that, the metaobject stays in sync whenever you save changes in the theme editor.


Note: Filter metaobjects are created from the theme editor, not from the Recipe Kit migration flow. If you've just enabled translations and don't see your filters in Translate & Adapt, open the theme editor and save the filter block first.


Translating Filters in Translate & Adapt

  1. Open Translate & Adapt (from Apps > Translate & Adapt, or click Manage Translations in Recipe Kit Settings)
  2. Select the language you want to translate into
  3. Scroll the Metaobjects section — look for an entry labeled [RecipeKit Filter] followed by your filter group names (e.g., "[RecipeKit Filter] Diet / Category / Cuisine")
Navigation menu in Metaobjects section of Translate & Adapt showing RecipeKit Filters metaobject

Auto-translating

  1. Click into the filter entry
  2. Click Auto-translate at the top of the page
  3. In the popup, click Translate
  4. Wait for the translations to fill in
  5. Click Save

Example of a translated filter metaobject

Each filter tag appears as its own list item in the rich text field, with a link. Translate & Adapt translates the visible tag name while preserving the link URL, which is how Recipe Kit retains the original tag value for navigation.


Manual translation

  1. Click into the filter entry
  2. For each field, type your translation in the right column
  3. For tag fields (rich text), translate the link text only — do not modify the link URL
  4. Click Save

Important: The tag fields use a special format where each tag is a link. The link text is the translated label and the link URL (starting with tag: ) contains the original tag value. Never edit the link URL — only translate the visible link text.


Multiple Filter Blocks

If you have more than one filter block (for example, on different blog templates), each block creates its own metaobject. You'll see a separate [RecipeKit Filter] entry in Translate & Adapt for each one, labeled with the filter group names from that block.


Updating Filter Translations

When you change filter settings in the theme editor (add new tags, rename a filter group, etc.):


  1. Save changes in the theme editor — the metaobject updates automatically
  2. Open Translate & Adapt and select an affected language
  3. Find the filter metaobject — Translate & Adapt highlights any changed fields
  4. Re-translate (auto or manual) and save
  5. Repeat for each non-primary language

Troubleshooting

Filter metaobject not showing in Translate & Adapt

  • Open the theme editor and navigate to the page with the filter block
  • Click on the filter block and save the theme — this triggers the sync
  • Wait a few seconds and refresh Translate & Adapt
  • Confirm automatic translations are enabled in Recipe Kit Settings

Filters show translated text but navigate to a 404 page

This means the link URLs in the rich text were edited during translation. The tag:  prefix and original tag value must stay unchanged. To fix:


  1. Open the filter entry in Translate & Adapt for the affected language
  2. Check the tag fields — look for modified link URLs
  3. Delete the broken translation for that field
  4. Re-translate using auto-translate or manually (only editing the link text, not the URL)
  5. Save

Filter dropdown shows "All" instead of the selected tag in a translated locale

  • Confirm the filter metaobject exists and has been translated
  • Confirm the tag values in the metaobject match the actual blog article tags in your source language
  • Clear your browser cache and reload the page

Translated filter options show tags that have no matching articles

If you have "Hide filter options with no recipes" enabled in the filter block settings but all options still appear in a translated locale, this is expected when no metaobject data is available. Once the filter metaobject is created and translated, the filter correctly checks each tag against existing blog articles and hides empty options.


What's Next?

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