How to Add Subtitles to Your Videos

If you aren’t using subtitles in your online videos, you’re missing a big opportunity.

How important are subtitles? According to a study by Verizon Media and Publicis Media, subtitles are hugely important. Consider the following statistics:

• 69% of survey respondents watch videos without sound in public places.
• 80% of viewers are more likely to watch a video to the end when there are subtitles.
• 50% of respondents claim captions are critical because they watch videos without the sound.

This proves just how critical the inclusion of subtitles is to keep viewers’ eyes on your videos.

How do you go about adding subtitles, though? Let’s take a look at some options.

Camtasia

One of the most popular video editing softwares available is Camtasia. With this piece of software you can edit your videos and add subtitles.

This can be accomplished either manually or automatically.

Manual method
Manually adding subtitles to your videos in Camtasia is very straightforward.

First, open your video in the software, then in the left hand side panel go to ‘Audio Effects’ and find ‘Captions.’  Drag this option down over the waveform of your video, and it will insert a caption editor. This defaults to a 4 second increment, but if you want one single long caption you can simply drag the right side of the caption block to the end of the video.

To add the text, it’s as simple as clicking on the caption block and typing in the transcription.

Automatic method
This method is, unfortunately, only available in the Windows version of Camtasia. But it is simple and effective. Note that it does require you already have your video script in a file.

In the left hand side panel simply go to ‘More,’ then choose ‘Captions.’ This will bring up a window where you can either import your script via a file, or you can click “Add Captions” to bring up a box for the text.

At this point you can either type the captions in, or simply paste the text.

Adobe Premiere

Adobe Premiere is a powerful video editing software, and it can easily handle subtitles. The easiest method of doing this is by importing your subtitles through a Subrip Subtitle (SRT) file. This file can be generated in a number of ways. There are online tools, such as Rev, where you can upload your video and get your subtitles automatically provided in this SRT file format.

Armed with this file, the process of adding subtitles to your video in Adobe Premiere is quite simple.

First, begin a new project in Adobe Premiere then click on File > Import to import your video. This will load both the video and audio into Adobe Premiere, and you should see a thumbnail of your video in the lower left window.

Click on the video thumbnail and drag it into the video timeline in the pane at the bottom of the Adobe Premiere window. You will see the waveform for the video appear in this timeline.

Now, look in the window pane to the upper left and you will see a few buttons, with one of them bing “Import Captions.” Click on this button, and a dialog will open to locate your subtitle file. Simply navigate to the SRT file that you had previously generated, and import it.

This will take your subtitles and automatically overlay them with your video. The only step left now is to click File > Export to export your video in your chosen format.

Add Subtitles to Facebook Videos

If you are uploading a video to Facebook, the process is about as simple as can be.

Simply go to your Facebook page and click “Photo/Video” under the create post button.

Choose your video file, and you will see a window that has an area where you can add captions and view a preview, among other options. In the upper-left corner you’ll see “Video Options”. Click this button and you will see some options, one of which is “Add Captions.”

Choose this option, and you will see the default option selected is auto-generated captions. Keep this option selected, and proceed to save your video options with the save button at the bottom. Complete the video upload process, and you will see you have auto-generated captions in your Facebook Video.

Final thoughts
There are many ways to add subtitles to your videos. We’ve gone over a few different options, some manual and others automatic.

These options do involve a little extra work that could be accomplished with a streamlined video editor with easy subtitle integration. Combo is a fast and efficient video editor that allows you to edit your videos, add subtitles, and convert to formats that work well with TikTok, Instagram, and Youtube in just a few clicks.

Take Combo for a spin with a free account, and if you decide you need the Pro features it’s a simple upgrade. This will save you a lot of time and effort in getting your ready for your channel.