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Apple’s iOS 13 makes the iPhone and iPad multilingual. Now, you can change the language of an individual app without changing your primary system language. Each app can have its own separate language setting.

First, ensure your iPhone or iPad has multiple languages installed. To do so, head to Settings > General > Language & Region. Tap “Other Languages” and add a language you want to use.

This is also where you can set your overall system language on your iPhone or iPad. But you don’t have to switch to the new language—just add it to this list.

Adding other languages to an iPhone or iPad.

Next, head to the main Settings screen and scroll down until you see an alphabetical list of installed apps. Tap the app you want to modify language settings for.

Google apps in the list of apps on the iPhone's Setting screen.

You’ll see a “Language” option under Preferred Language. Tap it and select the language you want to use for that app.

Repeat this process to change the language individually for additional apps.

Not every app offers multiple languages. If an app doesn’t offer additional languages, you won’t see a Language option on its settings screen at all.

Choosing a preferred language for an individual app on an iPhone with iOS 13.

If you don’t see the Language option on any app’s settings screen, you probably just don’t have multiple languages installed on your device.

Head to Settings > General > Language & Region and ensure you have more than one language on the list. If you don’t, the per-app Language option won’t appear.

Multiple languages in the Preferred Language Order list on an iPhone.

Profile Photo for Chris Hoffman Chris Hoffman
Chris Hoffman is Editor-in-Chief of How-To Geek. He's written about technology for over a decade and was a PCWorld columnist for two years. Chris has written for The New York Times and Reader's Digest, been interviewed as a technology expert on TV stations like Miami's NBC 6, and had his work covered by news outlets like the BBC. Since 2011, Chris has written over 2,000 articles that have been read more than one billion times---and that's just here at How-To Geek.
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