diff --git a/docs/translating/translating.md b/docs/translating/translating.md
index 3a9b023998..7c0c9388d7 100644
--- a/docs/translating/translating.md
+++ b/docs/translating/translating.md
@@ -100,11 +100,9 @@ There are a few ways to see your translations in the Zulip UI:
   prioritization (mostly copied from the Django docs):
 
   1. It looks for the language code as a URL prefix (e.g. `/de/login/`).
-  2. It looks for the `LANGUAGE_SESSION_KEY` key in the current user's
-     session (the Zulip language UI option ends up setting this).
-  3. It looks for the cookie named 'django_language'. You can set a
+  1. It looks for the cookie named 'django_language'. You can set a
      different name through the `LANGUAGE_COOKIE_NAME` setting.
-  4. It looks for the `Accept-Language` HTTP header in the HTTP request
+  1. It looks for the `Accept-Language` HTTP header in the HTTP request
      (this is how browsers tell Zulip about the OS/browser language).
 
 * Using an HTTP client library like `requests`, `cURL` or `urllib`,
diff --git a/zerver/lib/i18n.py b/zerver/lib/i18n.py
index b77d6e93cb..65dbf97d4e 100644
--- a/zerver/lib/i18n.py
+++ b/zerver/lib/i18n.py
@@ -95,8 +95,10 @@ def get_and_set_request_language(
         request_language = user_configured_language
     translation.activate(request_language)
 
-    # We also save the language to the user's session, so that
+    # We also want to save the language to the user's cookies, so that
     # something reasonable will happen in logged-in portico pages.
-    request.session[translation.LANGUAGE_SESSION_KEY] = translation.get_language()
+    # We accomplish that by setting a flag on the request which signals
+    # to LocaleMiddleware to set the cookie on the response.
+    request._set_language = translation.get_language()
 
     return request_language
diff --git a/zerver/middleware.py b/zerver/middleware.py
index 05c0b48f0d..11d65b7ffc 100644
--- a/zerver/middleware.py
+++ b/zerver/middleware.py
@@ -371,6 +371,7 @@ def csrf_failure(request: HttpRequest, reason: str="") -> HttpResponse:
 
 class LocaleMiddleware(DjangoLocaleMiddleware):
     def process_response(self, request: HttpRequest, response: HttpResponse) -> HttpResponse:
+
         # This is the same as the default LocaleMiddleware, minus the
         # logic that redirects 404's that lack a prefixed language in
         # the path into having a language.  See
@@ -382,6 +383,13 @@ class LocaleMiddleware(DjangoLocaleMiddleware):
         if not (i18n_patterns_used and language_from_path):
             patch_vary_headers(response, ('Accept-Language',))
         response.setdefault('Content-Language', language)
+
+        # An additional responsibility of our override of this middleware is to save the user's language
+        # preference in a cookie. That determination is made by code handling the request
+        # and saved in the _set_language flag so that it can be used here.
+        if hasattr(request, '_set_language'):
+            response.set_cookie(settings.LANGUAGE_COOKIE_NAME, request._set_language)
+
         return response
 
 class RateLimitMiddleware(MiddlewareMixin):