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Localization

Switching locales

Did you know Faker supports many different locales?
When using our default instance import { faker } from '@faker-js/faker' you get English data. However, we also provide pre-built instances for more than 50 other locales.

import { fakerDE as faker } from '@faker-js/faker'

See below for a list of available locales.

Note

You can also build your own Faker instances, with custom locales/overwrites.

Individual localized packages

Currently, the imports from the main package have a bug and always cause the entire Faker lib to be imported. This might result in loading around 5 MB of data into memory and slow down startup times.

But we got your back!
When encountering such a problem in a test or production environment, you can use the individual localized packages.

ts
import { faker } from '@faker-js/faker/locale/de';

This will then just load the German locales with additional English locales as fallback. The fallback is required due to not all locales containing data for all features. If you encounter a missing locale entry in your selected language, feel free to open a Pull Request fixing that issue.

INFO

The English locales are around 600 KB in size.
All locales together are around 5 MB in size.

Note

Some locales have limited coverage and rely more heavily on the English locale as the source for features they currently do not have. However, in most cases, using a specific locale will be beneficial in the long term as specifying a locale reduces the time necessary for startup, which has a compounding effect on testing frameworks that reload the imports every execution.

Custom locales and fallbacks

If our built-in faker instances don't satisfy your needs, you can build your own:

ts
import type { LocaleDefinition } from '@faker-js/faker';
import { Faker, de_CH, de, en, base } from '@faker-js/faker';

const customLocale: LocaleDefinition = {
  title: 'My custom locale',
  internet: {
    domainSuffix: ['test'],
  },
};

export const customFaker = new Faker({
  locale: [customLocale, de_CH, de, en, base],
});

In this example there are 5 locales. Each of these is checked in order, and the first locale which contains the requested data will be used:

  • customLocale is your custom locale definition which will override all other fallback definitions.
  • de_CH is a specific locale definition that overrides some German definitions with CH (Switzerland) data.
  • de is a generic de (German) locale definition.
  • en is a generic en (English) locale definition. This is our most complete locale, so we add it to fill some gaps. Depending on your needs, you might want or not want to have it as a fallback.
  • base is the base locale definition which contains definitions that can be used in every language (e.g. emojis).

Available locales

LocaleNameFaker
af_ZAAfrikaansfakerAF_ZA
arArabicfakerAR
azAzerbaijanifakerAZ
baseBasefakerBASE
czCzechfakerCZ
deGermanfakerDE
de_ATGerman (Austria)fakerDE_AT
de_CHGerman (Switzerland)fakerDE_CH
dvMaldivianfakerDV
elGreekfakerEL
enEnglishfakerEN
en_AUEnglish (Australia)fakerEN_AU
en_AU_ockerEnglish (Australia Ocker)fakerEN_AU_ocker
en_BORKEnglish (Bork)fakerEN_BORK
en_CAEnglish (Canada)fakerEN_CA
en_GBEnglish (Great Britain)fakerEN_GB
en_GHEnglish (Ghana)fakerEN_GH
en_IEEnglish (Ireland)fakerEN_IE
en_INEnglish (India)fakerEN_IN
en_NGEnglish (Nigeria)fakerEN_NG
en_USEnglish (United States)fakerEN_US
en_ZAEnglish (South Africa)fakerEN_ZA
esSpanishfakerES
es_MXSpanish (Mexico)fakerES_MX
faFarsifakerFA
fiFinnishfakerFI
frFrenchfakerFR
fr_BEFrench (Belgium)fakerFR_BE
fr_CAFrench (Canada)fakerFR_CA
fr_CHFrench (Switzerland)fakerFR_CH
fr_LUFrench (Luxembourg)fakerFR_LU
geGeorgianfakerGE
heHebrewfakerHE
hrCroatianfakerHR
huHungarianfakerHU
hyArmenianfakerHY
id_IDIndonesianfakerID_ID
itItalianfakerIT
jaJapanesefakerJA
koKoreanfakerKO
lvLatvianfakerLV
mkMacedonianfakerMK
nb_NONorwegianfakerNB_NO
neNepalesefakerNE
nlDutchfakerNL
nl_BEDutch (Belgium)fakerNL_BE
plPolishfakerPL
pt_BRPortuguese (Brazil)fakerPT_BR
pt_PTPortuguese (Portugal)fakerPT_PT
roRomanianfakerRO
ruRussianfakerRU
skSlovakianfakerSK
sr_RS_latinSerbian (Latin)fakerSR_RS_latin
svSwedishfakerSV
trTurkishfakerTR
ukUkrainianfakerUK
urUrdufakerUR
viVietnamesefakerVI
zh_CNChinesefakerZH_CN
zh_TWChinese (Taiwan)fakerZH_TW
zu_ZAZulu (South Africa)fakerZU_ZA

The Locale (data) and Faker columns refer to the respective import names:

ts
import { de, fakerDE } from '@faker-js/faker';

Released under the MIT License.