How to Turn On Captions and Subtitles for YouTube Videos

YouTube can display captions on any video — helpful if audio is hard to hear or you're watching without sound. Here's how to turn them on and customize them.

In this guide (5 steps):

1.Turn On Captions for a Single Video (Computer)
2.Turn On Captions for a Single Video (Phone)
3.Set YouTube to Always Show Captions
4.Make Captions Bigger and Easier to Read
5.Translate Captions to English

Turn On Captions for a Single Video (Computer)

~18s

While a video is playing, look for the CC button in the bottom-right area of the video controls (to the left of the Settings gear icon). Click CC to toggle captions on — a white underline appears under the button when captions are active. Click it again to turn them off.

Turn On Captions for a Single Video (Phone)

~21s

While a video is playing on the YouTube app, tap the screen once to show controls. Look for a speech bubble icon or a CC icon in the top-right corner of the video. Tap it to enable captions. If you do not see it, tap the three-dot menu (⋮) in the top right and look for "Captions" there.

Set YouTube to Always Show Captions

~18s

Open YouTube → tap your profile photo → SettingsCaptions → toggle on "Always Show Captions." From now on, captions turn on automatically for every video you watch.

Quick Tip

On a computer, go to YouTube settings (click your profile photo → SettingsPlayback & performance → "Always show captions").

Make Captions Bigger and Easier to Read

~21s

Open YouTube → tap your profile photo → SettingsCaptions → "Caption size and style." Increase the font size (try 150% or 200%). Change the font color or background color for better contrast.

Quick Tip

White text on a black background is the easiest to read. Choose "Background opacity" of 75% or higher so the text stands out from the video.

Translate Captions to English

~19s

If a video is in a foreign language, click the Settings gear icon on the video player → "Subtitles/CC" → "Auto-translate" → select "English." YouTube translates the captions in real time.

Warning

Auto-translated captions may be less accurate than original-language captions. For precise understanding of important content, this is a helpful starting point but not a perfect translation.

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YouTube automatically generates captions for most videos — text that appears at the bottom of the screen showing what is being said. This is helpful if you are watching in a noisy environment, have difficulty hearing, or are watching a video with a heavy accent or fast-talking presenter.

Captions on YouTube are generated automatically using speech recognition technology, which means they are usually very accurate for clearly spoken content but may have errors for technical terms, names, or heavy accents. Videos that a creator has manually captioned are even more accurate.

You can turn captions on or off for each video individually, or set YouTube to always show captions by default. You can also resize the captions, change the color, and adjust the font size in YouTube's settings.

Beyond English, YouTube often provides automatic captions in other languages, and many videos have translated captions too. This makes YouTube useful for people learning a language or for watching international content.

The caption button looks like a CC symbol (closed captioning) in the video controls. On a phone, it may also appear as a speech bubble icon or a small rectangular icon. The exact location depends on whether you are watching on a phone, tablet, or computer.

Automatic captions can be translated in real time — you can watch a Spanish or French video with English captions by using the Translation feature in YouTube's caption settings.

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