On some social media platforms (Twitter, for example), if a video has closed captions, they'll automatically be shown to people using mobile devices with the sound turned off. The advantage of closed captions is that they give your viewers the choice of watching the video with or without text, depending on their preference. Closed captions versus open captionsĬlosed captions can be turned on or off, whereas open captions are burned into the video track and are therefore always visible. Whether you choose to provide captions or subtitles will depend on your target audience and your video's intended application. Subtitles include a transcript of just the speech or dialogue. Subtitles, on the other hand, assume that viewers can hear the audio but need a text alternative – for example, when viewers don't understand or aren't fluent in the language spoken in the video. In addition to a transcript of the speech or dialogue, they include speaker labels and a description of non-speech sounds. In the US and Canada, a distinction is made between captions and subtitles.Ĭaptions are intended for viewers who can't hear the audio. Captions versus subtitles: What's the difference? In this tutorial, we'll look at the most common caption and subtitle formats, as well as how you can easily create your own closed captions using free software.įirst, some basic definitions. More importantly, captions make your videos accessible to a wider audience, including non-native speakers and the deaf and hard of hearing.Ĭaptions also provide SEO benefits: Their text can be crawled and indexed by search engine robots, making your video discoverable for a larger number of keyword phrases. For example, they might be on public transport, in a waiting room, or not wanting to disturb others around them. The reality is that many people prefer to watch videos with captions turned on, or even read a transcript posted alongside the video itself. Take Facebook as an example, where up to 85 percent of videos are watched without sound. If you're not adding captions or subtitles to your videos, you're missing out on a big marketing opportunity.
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