Internationalization support

  • Release version: Australia
  • Updated July 1, 2026
  • 2 minutes to read
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    Summary of Internationalization support

    AI Search in ServiceNow supports indexing and searching across all languages offered by the ServiceNow AI Platform®. Search administrators can configure language-specific search features for any languages activated within their instance, enabling tailored and effective search experiences for global users.

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    Search features by language

    Different AI Search features are supported for various languages to optimize search relevance and accuracy. Key supported features across many languages include Genius Results, Language Identification, Lemma and Unicode normalization, Result Improvement Rules, Stop Words, Synonyms, and Typo Handling.

    • Arabic, Brazilian Portuguese, Czech, Dutch, English, French (including French-Canada), Hebrew, Italian, Polish, Russian, Spanish, Turkish: Full feature set including lemma and Unicode normalization.
    • Finnish: Features including language identification and algorithmic stemming for lemmas.
    • German, Danish, Hungarian, Norwegian (Bokmål), Swedish: Features include decompounding in lemma and Unicode normalization.
    • Japanese, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese: Language identification includes text-region and search-term identification.
    • Korean: Includes decompounding with lemma and Unicode normalization.
    • Other AI Platform languages: Support for Unicode normalization, result improvement rules, stop words, and synonyms.

    Translated content search

    By default, AI Search returns results for records translated into the user's session language. This behavior is configurable to enhance multilingual search effectiveness:

    • Assign Knowledge article search languages by country: Users can search knowledge articles in multiple languages associated with their country, expanding match possibilities beyond their session language.
    • Configure globally searchable knowledge articles: Define queries to make certain knowledge articles searchable regardless of user session language.
    • Set a fallback language: Specify a fallback language for user sessions so AI Search returns results in both the session and fallback languages.
    • Enable a global fallback locale: Apply a global fallback locale to all translated content searches, commonly used to make English-language records searchable worldwide.

    Note: The global fallback locale is especially useful for ensuring English content availability across all users regardless of their session language.

    AI Search supports indexing and search for all languages offered by the ServiceNow AI Platform®. Search administrators can configure AI Search search features for languages activated in your instance.

    For full details on language support in AI Search search features, see Internationalization support for AI Search.

    Search features

    The following table lists the AI Search search features available for specific ServiceNow AI Platform languages.

    Table 1. Search features supported by language
    Language Search features supported
    Arabic, Brazilian Portuguese, Czech, Dutch, English, French, French - Canada, Hebrew, Italian, Polish, Russian, Spanish, and Turkish
    Finnish
    German, Danish, Hungarian, Norwegian (Bokmål), and Swedish
    Japanese, Simplified Chinese, and Traditional Chinese
    Korean
    All other ServiceNow AI Platform languages activated in your instance

    Translated content search

    By default, AI Search only returns results for records with translated content, such as knowledge articles, that are in the user's ServiceNow AI Platform session language. You can modify this default behavior in the following ways:
    Assign Knowledge article search languages by country
    Improve multilingual search recall by defining a set of Knowledge article search languages for each user country. User searches can match Knowledge articles in any of the search languages specified for their country as well as in the language associated with their ServiceNow AI Platform session.
    Configure globally searchable knowledge articles
    Define an encoded query to match knowledge articles that you want to make searchable regardless of the user's session language.
    Configure a fallback language
    Set a fallback language for the user's session language. AI Search returns translated content results from the selected fallback language as well as the user's session language.
    Enable a global fallback locale for translated content
    Configure a global fallback locale to use for all translated content searches. AI Search returns translated content results from the global fallback locale's language as well as the user's session language.
    Note:
    The global fallback locale works best if you want to make all English-language records globally searchable.