Formal and informal address, language by language
English has one word for “you”, so English-speaking teams never make this decision. Most other languages force it on every screen — and picking differently on two screens is the thing native speakers notice first.
Why it is a product decision, not a translation one
The register sets how your product sounds: distant and correct, or close and casual. Banks and public services usually choose formal; consumer apps usually choose informal. Either is fine. Drifting between them is not.
Formal
Respectful distance. Safe for finance, health, government, B2B and anything a lawyer reviews.
Informal
Closer and warmer. Normal for consumer apps in Germany, the Nordics and the Netherlands.
Decide once, per language
Not per screen and not per translator. The cost of getting it wrong is re-reading every string in that language.
The table
| Language | Formal | Informal |
|---|---|---|
German de | Sie / Ihnen / Ihr | du / dich / dein |
French fr | vous / votre / vos | tu / ton / ta / tes |
Spanish es | usted, third-person verbs | tú, second-person verbs |
Portuguese pt | você, o senhor / a senhora | tu, second-person verbs |
Italian it | Lei, third-person singular | tu, second-person singular |
Dutch nl | u / uw | jij / je / jouw |
Russian ru | Вы / Ваш | ты / твой |
Ukrainian uk | Ви / Ваш | ти / твій |
Polish pl | Pan / Pani | ty |
Czech cs | vy / vás / váš | ty / tebe / tvůj |
Turkish tr | siz, -InIz endings | sen, singular endings |
Catalan ca | vostè | tu |
Swedish sv | ni / er (dated) | du / din |
Danish da | De / Dem / Deres (dated) | du / dig / din |
Norwegian nb | De / Dem / Deres (dated) | du / deg / din |
Indonesian id | Anda | kamu |
Hindi hi | आप, plural agreement | तुम |
Persian fa | شما | تو |
Chinese zh | 您 | 你 |
Japanese ja | です・ます, 尊敬語 / 謙譲語 | plain 辞書形 / だ・である |
Korean ko | 합쇼체 / 해요체 (-습니다, -세요) | 해체 / 반말 |
Thai th | คุณ with ครับ / ค่ะ | plain, no particles |
Three traps
- 1The formal form has agedSwedish ni and Danish and Norwegian De were standard within living memory and now read as stiff or archaic. Formal Swedish in 2026 means careful phrasing, not ni.
- 2It is not always a pronounJapanese and Korean mark politeness in the verb ending, and Spanish and Italian shift the whole conjugation. A glossary that only lists pronouns will not hold the register.
- 3Shipping both is a real requirementOne product, formal in Germany and informal in Austria; or a white-label customer whose brand is warmer than yours. That means two German variants, not one compromise.
In locoloop the register is a setting per locale, and a formal variant can be rebased on its approved informal sibling so the approved wording carries over and only the address changes. How formality registers work →
Set the register before your first translation pass
It is one field per language, and it saves the week where somebody re-reads every screen.