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devahmedshendy/remove-language-xcstrings.md

Created January 27, 2026 12:35
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remove-language-xcstrings.md

Description

A quick utility to remove a specific language from Apple's String Catalog (.xcstrings) files using jq.

Credit: This solution was provided by Jayson Rhynas, Co-founder of medlylabs.com.

The Problem

Currently, Xcode's String Catalog editor doesn't provide a global "Delete Language" option. Manually deleting a language from every single key is tedious for large projects.

The Solution: jq

If you have jq installed (via brew install jq), you can strip a language from the JSON structure of the .xcstrings file directly.

One-Liner (Standard)

Replace fr with the language code you want to remove (e.g., de, es, zh-Hans).

# 1. Back up your file
cp Localizable.xcstrings Localizable.xcstrings.bak

# 2. Filter out the unwanted language and overwrite
jq '.strings |= map_values(del(.localizations."fr"))' Localizable.xcstrings.bak > Localizable.xcstrings
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