Getting Started

Follow this guide to get your account setup and publish your app listings in all 88 languages in about 30 minutes.

Account Creation

30 second startup -- create your account and first project.

Store Linking

Connect Google Play and/or the App Store to your new project.

Store Text

Setup your store listing strings, translate into 88 langs, and publish to the stores.

Screenshots

Strings, translations, Figma, and store submission 🚀

Overview

This guide walks through the four major steps involved with setting up Apgio for your app, generating your first translation sets and publishing to Google Play and the App Store.

The Steps

Create an Apgio account and first project - 30 seconds
Link Google Play Console and/or App Store Connect - 5 minutes
Store text import, translation, and publishing - 5 minutes
Screenshot text setup, translation, Figma setup and exports, and publishing - 20min

Requirements

To follow this guide, you'll need the following:

An existing app in Google Play Console and/or App Store Connect.
'App Manager' level permissions on the Google Play Console / App Store Connect.
A Figma account.

Account Creation & First Project

On the Apgio website, click any of the Get Started buttons.
Use Google SSO or provide email+password.
Once in Apgio, click the New Project button.
Give your project a name (usually the name of your app) and specify the primary locale. This is the language that your source strings are in.

👉 Done

Link Stores

This step can go very quickly if you know your way around the permission systems in App Store Connect and Google Play Console / Google Cloud. It is a bit technical but we've prepped precise minimal instructions to make it as straightforward as possible. You can always get in touch with us if you have any questions (Contact Us).

Google Play Console

Google Play Link Instructions

App Store Connect

App Store Link Instructions

Store Text Listings

Publishing your app listings in 88 languages with Apgio involves three main steps -- Input String Setup, Translation, Store Submission.

Import Input Strings

In your project, go to Store Text > Strings.
Click on the three dot button at the top right.
Choose import from Google Play (if linked in previous step).
Do again for the App Store (if linked).

ℹ️ Alternatively, you can copy and paste your store description and associated strings into each item in the table.

Generate Translations

Hit the Translate button.
Check progress in the Activity area.
Once translations are complete go to the Translations area.

Review & Submit

Review the translations in any language using the drop-down language picker.
Click the Publish button.
Select the desired store and confirm. Publishing will happen immediately.
Hit the Publish button again and select the other store and proceed.

👉 Done.

Success!

Your app listings are now submitted in 88 languages across the two stores. Note that Google Play will automatically review and push your new text live, typically within an hour. Apple requires the updated listing text to be submitted for review with a new app version.

Screenshots

And now for Apgio's superpower -- screenshots

Apgio preserves your unlimited design freedom in Figma while seamlessly enabling localization in all 88 languages supported by Google Play and the App Store.

The initial steps for screenshot localization are similar to those for your Store Text Listings. You need to setup some input strings then translate them...

Setup Input Strings

⚡️ Go to Screenshots -> Strings

You'll find an initial set of empty strings.

For now just put some text in the first three strings (string_0, string_1, and string_2).

Generate & Review Translations

⚡️ Hit Translate

The strings will be translated into all 88 languages in a matter of seconds. Monitor progress in the Activity area.

⚡️ Go to Translations

You can preview the translated strings in each language using the drop down language picker.

Figma: Build & Export Screenshots

⚡️ Open Figma

If you have an existing Figma file for your screenshots, open it.

Open the Apgio Figma Screenshot file: Get It Here

This file provides frames in the required sizes for Google Play and the App Store as well as some additional common sizes that you might want to use.

📱 Design Your Screens

We recommend starting with the iPhone 6.9" and Android 'Phone' sizes.

Copy and paste existing assets if you have them for your screenshots.

Place your text fields however you want on your screens.

Fonts & Figma

Apgio uses some pretty clever (💅) techniques in font selection and text sizing when generating translated screenshots.

There are also a few tricks that you can employ to ensure that translated text stays constrained within the boundaries you want.

Learn More

🔌 Setup Apgio Figma Plugin

Install the Apgio Figma 'Bridge' Plugin: Get It Here

This utility provides the 'bridge' between Figma and your Apgio account -- it:

Brings your translated strings from Appgeo into Figma
Sets up the Figma file's string variable collection, making fast string swapping possible.
Performs export of your finished frames and uploading into your Apgio account

The plugin needs to be linked to your Apgio account:

Run the plugin in Figma and you'll be asked for your Project ID and Plugin Key
In your project on Apgio, go to Project Config
Scroll down to Figma Plugin
Copy and paste the Project ID and Plugin Key into the Figma plugin and continue.

Preview Translated Strings

String Variables

The bridge plugin will swap the translated strings in your frames for any text fields that are bound to the string variables. If you put text into the text fields that already existed in the Appgeo Figma doc, then the binding is already done and string swapping will work "out of the box".

If you didn't use the existing text fields from the sample file or you added more, you need to bind the text fields to variables. This might be totally familiar for you, but if not, check out our doc on this...

Learn More

The brige plugin allows you to quickly swap between any of the 88 languages to see how your screenshots look in that language.

You'll see immediately that different scripts take up different amounts of vertical and horizontal space. Apgio uses refined logic to adjust the font used for each language to maximize the design confirmity to your original version. With that said, there are some techniques you'll want to employ that will ensure near total refinement (learn more ).

Export Translated Screenshots

Once satisfied with the translated screens in Figma...

⚡️ Hit the Export button

You can choose which sizes and languages to export. Once kicked off exports can take between a minute and an hour depending on how many sizes and languages you're exporting.

For example, if you export five frames per size, in all sizes, in all languages -- that is nearly 4,000 frames!

🛫 Review & Publish Screens

Back on the Apgio site, go to Screenshots > Screens for your project.

Here you can again spot-check and review your screenshots across sizes and languages.

Once you're satisfied that they are production-ready, hit Publish and select the desired options.

⏱️ The screen publishing process is long-running and you can monitor progress in the Activity area. We'll also send you an email once all screenshots have been submitted successfully.

Screen publishing takes a long time becuase of strict rate limiting enforced by Apple and Google on their APIs. Apgio is designed to stay under the rate limits and gracefully recover if a limit is still hit for some reason.

Recap

Ok, that was a lot! But we did it. Your app is now localized in 88 languages across both Google Play and the App Store -- screenshots, app description, and more. This is huge, you're now a global player 🙌🌎

That's the promise of Apgio delivered, we're always interested in your input -- get in touch with ideas, problems, any feedback, we want to hear it 🙏