How to Change Language in Looker Studio

Changing the language in Looker Studio (formerly Google Data Studio) isn't as straightforward as clicking a button within the tool itself, because the setting is actually tied to your primary Google Account. This guide will walk you through exactly how to adjust this setting, explain the important effects this change will have across all your Google apps, and offer an alternative for creating multi-language reports.

Why Change the Language in Looker Studio?

Before we jump into the "how," let's quickly cover the "why." You might find yourself needing to switch the user interface language for several common reasons:

• Client Needs: You’re building a dashboard for a client in another country and want to see the report from their perspective.
• Team Collaboration: You work with a multilingual team and need to align on a common language for documentation or training purposes.
• Personal Preference: The language was set incorrectly by default, or you're simply more comfortable working in a different language.
• Training and Demos: You're creating training materials or conducting a demonstration for an audience that speaks a different language.

Whatever your reason, understanding how to manage this setting is a useful skill for any Looker Studio user.

The Key: Looker Studio's Language is Your Google Account's Language

This is the most important concept to grasp: Looker Studio does not have an independent language setting. It simply inherits the language preference you've set for your overall Google Account. This means to change what you see in the Looker Studio menus and interface, you must change your Google Account language.

While this is simple in practice, it has one major implication: changing the language will affect all of your other Google services. Your Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Drive, and other connected apps will also switch to the new language. It’s a global change, not just a Looker Studio-specific one. So, be prepared for your entire Google ecosystem to look a little different.

Step-by-Step: How to Change Your Google Account Language

Ready to make the switch? The process only takes a minute. Just follow these steps carefully.

1. Go to Your Google Account Settings

Your journey begins in your main Google Account dashboard. You can get there directly by navigating to myaccount.google.com in your web browser. Make sure you're logged into the correct Google Account - the one you use for Looker Studio.

2. Open "Personal Info"

On the left-hand navigation menu, click on Personal info. This section contains your basic profile information like your name, birthday, and contact details, but it's also where your general web preferences are stored.

3. Find the Language Settings

Scroll down the "Personal info" page until you see a section titled General preferences for the web. The very first option here will be Language. Click on it to proceed.

4. Select a New Language

Here you'll see your current "Preferred language." To change it, click the pencil icon next to it. A new screen will appear with a search box. Start typing the language you want to switch to (e.g., "Spanish," "German," "French"). As you type, Google will suggest relevant languages. You may also see regional variations, such as "Espanol (España)" vs. "Espanol (Latinoamérica)." Choose the one that best fits your needs and click Select.

Your Google Account will immediately update. Some parts of the settings page may even refresh instantly to reflect the new language.

Verifying the Change in Looker Studio

Now that your Google Account language is updated, it's time to see the results in Looker Studio. The change isn't always instant and sometimes requires a little nudge.

First, navigate back to your Looker Studio report in a new browser tab. If the language hasn't changed, try these steps:

1. Refresh the Page: A simple refresh (Ctrl+R on Windows, Cmd+R on Mac) is often a solid first step.
2. Do a Hard Refresh: If a simple refresh doesn't work, a hard refresh will clear your browser's cache for the page. Use Ctrl+Shift+R (Windows) or Cmd+Shift+R (Mac).
3. Sign Out and Back In: In some cases, you may need to totally log out of your Google Account and then log back in to force all services, including Looker Studio, to recognize the updated language setting.

Once it works, you'll see all of the Looker Studio interface elements in your newly selected language. For example, "File" will become "Archivo" in Spanish, "Add a chart" will become "Diagramm hinzufügen" in German, and so on. The entire user interface, from menus and buttons to helper text, will now be localized.

An Important Distinction: Interface vs. Data

Changing the language only affects the Looker Studio user interface - the operational parts of the tool. It does not translate any of the content you've created within your reports.

This means:

• Your source data will remain in its original language. If your Google Sheet column is named "Sales," it will still appear as "Sales."
• Any text boxes, headlines, or chart titles you've manually typed will remain as you wrote them.
• Manually created dimension and metric names will not be translated.

So, if you change your language to French, your data source might still be in English, creating a hybrid view. Be aware of this when building reports.

How Report Language Appears to Others

Similarly, the language setting is tied to each individual's Google Account. If your account is set to German and you create a report, a collaborator with their account set to Spanish will see the Looker Studio interface in Spanish when they view it. They will still see your untranslated manual text and data fields as you created them.

Workarounds for Creating Multi-Language Reports

So what do you do when you need to create a dashboard that's fully translated - interface, data, and all - for different audiences? Since Looker Studio doesn't automatically translate your report's content, you'll need a manual approach.

The most reliable method is to duplicate and translate your report.

1. Finalize the original version of your report in your primary language.
2. Make a full copy of the report for each language you need. Go to File > Make a copy.
3. Rename the new report to specify its language (e.g., "Q3 Sales Report [FR]").
4. Go through the duplicated report and manually translate every piece of text you added: chart titles, axis labels, text boxes, headers, comments, etc.

This process sounds tedious, because it is. However, it gives you complete control over the final product and ensures accurate, clear communication for each audience. For most use cases, this is the most practical solution.

Final Thoughts

In short, changing the display language in Looker Studio is a matter of adjusting your global Google Account settings. Once you understand that the tool reflects your account-wide preferences, the process is simple, though it's important to remember this change will apply to your entire Google suite, not just your reports.

For those of us who spend hours wrangling data sources and adjusting dashboard layouts, setting up reports shouldn't feel like another difficult chore. That’s why we built Graphed, where you can bypass the manual configuration entirely. Instead of clicking through menus and configuring charts piece by piece, you just connect your data and ask in plain English for what you want to see. This turns hours of building into a 30-second conversation, letting you focus on the insights hidden in your data, not the technicalities of the tool.