Disclosed are systems, methods, and non-transitory computer-readable storage media for obtaining a translation of a previous version of a display item to present on a graphical user interface when a translation of a current version of the display item is unavailable. A client device can request a translation of a display item in a graphical user interface invoked by the client device. The client device can send a server a first key corresponding to the current version of the display item, a second key corresponding to a previous version of the display item, and locale information describing the current location and/or language preferences of the client device. If the server cannot obtain a translation corresponding to the first key, the server can obtain a translation of the previous version of the display item in the language associated with the locale based on the second key.