Translation Engine – AI Providers

The plugin supports five translation providers. You pick one in Settings → General, paste its API key and choose a model. Only one provider is active at a time.

#Available engines

#OpenAI

Full LLM translation – follows the translation prompt, the website description, the glossary and the reasoning effort setting. Billed per token.

• Get an API key: https://platform.openai.com/api-keys
• Step-by-step guide: https://help.openai.com/en/articles/4936850-where-do-i-find-my-openai-api-key
• Key format: starts with sk-

Recommended mode: Background. It is the only provider offering it, and it never depends on your server surviving a long request. If speed does not matter, use Batch instead – same result for about 50% less.

#Anthropic (Claude)

Full LLM translation, same prompt/context/glossary support as OpenAI. Billed per token.

• Get an API key: https://console.anthropic.com/settings/keys
• Step-by-step guide: https://platform.claude.com/docs/en/get-api-key
• Key format: starts with sk-ant-

Claude has no background mode, so asynchronous jobs always go through the Batch API – and Claude batches usually take 2–8 hours.

#Google Gemini

Full LLM translation, same prompt/context/glossary support. Billed per token.

• Get an API key: https://aistudio.google.com/apikey
• Step-by-step guide: https://ai.google.dev/gemini-api/docs/api-key

#DeepL

A machine-translation engine, not an LLM. It translates text instead of following instructions, so the translation prompt, the website description and the reasoning effort are ignored. Glossary terms are respected – they are uploaded to DeepL as a native glossary. Billed per character.

• Get an API key: https://www.deepl.com/your-account/keys
• Step-by-step guide: https://developers.deepl.com/docs/getting-started/auth
• Free keys end with :fx and are routed to the free endpoint automatically.

Synchronous only (no Batch API), but content is split into many small requests, so long posts are safe.

#Google Translate

A machine-translation engine, not an LLM. The translation prompt, website description, reasoning effort and the glossary are all ignored. Billed per character.

• Get an API key: https://console.cloud.google.com/apis/credentials
• Step-by-step guide: https://cloud.google.com/translate/docs/setup
• Requires a Google Cloud API key with the Cloud Translation API enabled.

Synchronous only, content split into small requests – safe for long posts.

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#Processing Mode

The processing mode decides how each translation is sent to the provider and when the result comes back.

#Synchronous (wait for result)

The cron calls the provider and waits for the answer in the same run, so the translation appears within a minute or two. Full price.

Best for short content (terms, titles, strings) and for seeing results immediately while setting things up.

#Batch (cheaper, delayed)

The request is handed to the provider’s Batch API for about 50% of the normal price and polled every minute until it is ready.

• OpenAI / Gemini: most batches come back in 10–60 minutes (typically 20–30).
• Anthropic (Claude): usually 2–8 hours.

The only guarantee providers give is a 24-hour window, so a single job can take much longer at peak times. Best for bulk translating many or long posts, where cost matters more than speed.

#Background (OpenAI only)

The request is started without blocking and polled every minute, usually finishing in a few minutes. Full price, but it never depends on your server surviving a long request – the safest choice for long posts.

#⚠️ Warning: long content in Synchronous mode can fail.

One long post is a single HTTP request that can take minutes, so it may be cut short by a PHP, web-server or proxy timeout – and the whole translation is then retried from scratch. For long posts and bulk jobs pick Batch (or Background on OpenAI).