Use case
Captions for accessibility and inclusion
Captions are the rare accessibility measure whose primary audience is far larger than the group it was designed for. Building them in by default costs less than retrofitting them, and helps more people than the requirement anticipates.
Who is actually reading your captions
- Viewers who are deaf or hard of hearing, for whom captions are the content rather than a supplement.
- Viewers watching without sound, which is most social viewing and a large share of viewing in offices, transport, and shared homes.
- Viewers watching in a second language, who follow written text more comfortably than spoken.
- Viewers with auditory processing differences, for whom text alongside speech is substantially easier than speech alone.
- Anyone dealing with unfamiliar accents, poor audio, or a noisy room.
What separates present from usable
An auto-generated caption track that exists but is wrong fails the person who depends on it most, because they have no way to detect the error. The standards care about presence; the viewer cares about accuracy. See video accessibility and captions for what the standards actually require.
- Accurate words, especially names, numbers, and technical terms.
- Readable timing. Text that flashes past faster than it can be read excludes the people it was meant to include.
- Speaker identification where the picture does not make it clear who is talking.
- Sound that carries meaning, where the audio conveys something the picture does not.
- Synchronisation. Captions that drift out of time are actively harder to use than none.
A workable process
Generate a first pass
Select the original spoken language to get same-language captions timed to the video.
Correct what carries meaning
Names, numbers, and specialist terms first. These are where automatic transcription is least reliable and where an error does the most damage.
Add speaker and sound information where it is needed
In the subtitle editor on the Pro and Studio plans, or in the downloaded SRT file.
Publish both forms
The burned-in MP4 for places that ignore subtitle files, and the SRT where viewers can switch it on and restyle it to suit them.
Caption your first video with 50 free credits, then review what matters.
Continue with Google50 free credits. No credit card needed.Frequently asked questions
Are automatic captions accessible enough?
As a first pass, yes. As a finished product, only after review. A caption track containing the wrong words fails the viewer relying on it, because they cannot tell it is wrong.
Should captions include sound effects?
Sound that carries meaning, yes, such as a phone ringing or a door closing. Ambient noise that adds nothing does not need annotating and only clutters the screen.
Are burned-in captions accessible?
They guarantee the text is visible everywhere, which matters. Soft subtitles are better where supported, because viewers can resize and reposition them. Publishing both covers more people than either alone.
Do I get captions in the original language?
Yes. Select the original spoken language and you get same-language captions rather than a translation, which is what accessibility and silent viewing both need.