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This thread is resolved. Here is a description of the problem and solution.

Problem:
When switching to French and then navigating to another page, the site reverts back to the default language (English).
Solution:
1. Ensure that the menu translations are correctly synced:
- Navigate to WordPress Dashboard > WPML > WP Menu Sync.
- Click the sync button.
- Check all the checkboxes displayed.
- Click start to finish the syncing process.
For more information, visit Translating Menus.

2. If using the Custom Link menu type in WP Dashboard > Appearance > Menus, manually translate the links:
- Go to WP Dashboard > String translation.
- From the top filter, select the Menu in question as the text domain and click filter.
- Translate the listed labels and links.
For more information, visit Custom Links in Menus.

If this solution does not apply to your case, or if it seems outdated, we recommend opening a new support ticket. We also highly recommend checking related known issues at https://wpml.org/known-issues/, verifying the version of the permanent fix, and confirming that you have installed the latest versions of themes and plugins. For further assistance, please contact us through the WPML support forum.

This is the technical support forum for WPML - the multilingual WordPress plugin.

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This topic contains 1 replies, has 0 voices.

Last updated by alynG 2 weeks, 2 days ago.

Assisted by: Christopher Amirian.

Author Posts
April 25, 2026 at 3:03 pm #17994700

alynG

When someone switches to French and then clicks another page, it always goes back to the default.

How to ensure that when you select French at the top of the site, the entire site stays on French and does not default back to English on the next click.

April 26, 2026 at 8:53 am #17995132

Christopher Amirian
WPML Supporter since 07/2020

Languages: English (English )

Timezone: Asia/Yerevan (GMT+04:00)

Hello and welcome to WPML support.

Would you please provide the debug information?

https://wpml.org/faq/provide-debug-information-faster-support/

-----------

I checked the website and went to this link as an example:

hidden link

and then used the language switcher and it worked ok:

hidden link

This shows that the destination pages have translations and work ok an dthe issue is actually the menu translation.

I checked the menu and found out that the menu labels work ok but not the menu links.

Would you please follow the steps below?

- Go to WordPress Dashboard > WPML > WP Menu Sync.
- Click the sync button.
- Check all the checkboxes showing.
- Click the start to finish the syncing process.
- For more information:

https://wpml.org/documentation/getting-started-guide/translating-menus/

One other point. If in the WP Dashboard > Appearance > Menus you used the Custom Link menu type, you should manually translate the links following the steps below:

- Go to WP Dashboard > String translation
- From the top filter, select the Menu in question as the text domain and click filter.
- You will see a list of the labels and links that you need to translate.

For more information:
https://wpml.org/documentation/getting-started-guide/translating-menus/#custom-links

Thanks.

April 29, 2026 at 1:26 am #18001251

alynG

Thank you

I followed the steps and it appears to have resolved the issue