WPML ElasticPress – Fast, Language-Correct Search for Multilingual WordPress Sites
ElasticPress turbocharges WordPress search with an Elasticsearch back-end that returns relevant results in milliseconds. WPML ElasticPress is the compatibility add-on that makes that search work correctly across every language on your site, so visitors browsing in French search and get French results, visitors in Japanese search and get Japanese results, and no result page ever mixes languages.
WPML ElasticPress is included with Multilingual CMS and Agency. ElasticPress itself is the 10up open-source plugin you may already be running for fast search; WPML and 10up maintain the compatibility plugin together.
Fast, Relevant Search in Every Language Your Visitors Browse In
ElasticPress is built around language-aware text analysis (singular and plural forms, tense, stemming, common abbreviations), so a search for “running shoes” matches “runner’s shoe”, and the French equivalent matches its French variants. The WPML compatibility layer keeps each language’s index separate, so French stemming never bleeds into English results and vice versa.
Each language on your site gets its own Elasticsearch index, analyzed in that language. A visitor on the French version sees only French results; a visitor on the Japanese version sees only Japanese results. The integration handles this automatically. There’s no per-language configuration to maintain.
Search Inside Attached Documents – Per Language
ElasticPress’s Documents feature indexes the text inside attached PDFs, Word files, PowerPoint presentations, plain-text files, and similar formats. Site search reaches the contents of every document your posts and pages link to.
WPML ElasticPress filters Documents results by the visitor’s language too. Upload a translated PDF for a French page and the French search finds it, not the English original.
Built for Publishers, News Sites, Knowledge Bases, and Large Archives
ElasticPress is purpose-built for content-heavy WordPress sites where the built-in search runs out of room: publishers, news archives, knowledge bases, government portals, education sites, agencies managing multi-site networks. The WPML compatibility layer takes that same fast, relevant, faceted search and makes it work correctly per language, so a multilingual archive of thousands of articles serves visitors in every language equally well.
The currently supported ElasticPress features are:
- Post Search. The main front-end search across posts, pages, and custom post types.
- Related Posts. The Related Posts widget pulls in same-language matches only.
- Documents. Search inside PDFs,
.docx,.pptx, and other attached files per language. - Terms, Comments, and Users. Backend searches across taxonomy terms, comments, and registered users.
What’s Not Covered Yet – WooCommerce Search
ElasticPress includes a separate WooCommerce module that powers fast product discovery and faceted filtering across large product catalogues. WPML ElasticPress’s multilingual layer does not currently cover ElasticPress’s WooCommerce-specific search features. Extending coverage to WooCommerce is on the WPML roadmap, but it’s not delivered yet.
If your primary need is fast multilingual product search across a WooCommerce catalogue, today’s stack handles WooCommerce search through WPML’s WooCommerce Multilingual add-on; the ElasticPress side of that flow is the next piece to land. For sites where ElasticPress powers post and document search alongside a WooCommerce store, post and document search are fully multilingual today; the WooCommerce-specific ElasticPress features behave as they do on a single-language site.
Recommended Plugin, Continuous Compatibility
ElasticPress is a recommended plugin on WPML’s compatibility list, thanks to its commitment to continued compatibility and partnership with WPML. The WPML and 10up teams work together on the compatibility plugin, shipping updates against current ElasticPress releases and extending multilingual coverage to new ElasticPress features as they land.
Get WPML ElasticPress
Buy WPML to get WPML ElasticPress – it’s included with Multilingual CMS and Agency.