YouTube subtitle generatorAI tools for YouTubersYouTube captionsThe Ultimate Guide to YouTube Subtitles: How to Create, Translate, and Use Them
Sherlin Jannet

Sherlin Jannet

4 min read

The Ultimate Guide to YouTube Subtitles: How to Create, Translate, and Use Them

YouTube first came up with automated captions in 2009. Since then captioned videos have been well received by the YouTube audience and people across other platforms. The inclusivity and accessibility of subtitles has helped creators and audiences connect better. Here’s how you can connect better with your audience as a creator, with the help of YouTube subtitles. In this ultimate guide, we delve into the world of YouTube subtitles, learning how to create, translate and use them.

Why should you add subtitles to your YouTube videos?

Better accessibility

Stats show that 75% of people watch their videos on mute, which means that the majority of your audience would need captions to watch your videos. Adding captions to your YouTube video is mandatory to serving your audience that is inclusive of people who watch videos in noisy places or people who are hearing-impaired.

Improved SEO

YouTube algorithm works in such a way that it analyses all the text in and around your video and your subtitles are no exception. The subtitles in your video may contain important keywords that can help you reach a higher rank on YouTube’s search engine.

Higher engagement

Videos with subtitles receive a higher watch-time. This might be because, in addition to people having better accessibility, reading information is more comprehensible and people enjoy video-content better when they read along as they watch.

Reach a wider audience

Subtitles have always been famous among movie fans who love watching films in foreign languages. Similarly, breaking language, dialect or accent barriers can help you reach global audiences. Adding subtitles in just one global language such as English can make a vast difference.

Ways in which YouTubers add subtitles to their videos

YouTube studio

YouTube studio is like the backstage for YouTube, it’s where content creators upload, edit and add subtitles to videos. YouTube creators can add their subtitles manually by pausing the video as needed to type in the subtitles. This is a very tedious process and requires you to spend a lot of time and energy. And although YouTube Studio provides auto-captioning and supports subtitles in multiple languages, the quality of it is questionable. The subtitles you type in for a video are also not exportable and you will have to write them again if they are to be used elsewhere.

Transcription services

By opting for transcription services, you can have people manually transcribe the video for you. Using transcription services for your YouTube videos can save your time and be of convenience to you but they aren’t cheap. Not only do they cost a lot but also they are not always 100% perfect. They may not be able to catch certain phrases, special terminologies, accents or unique pronunciations, which means, you will have to re-check your subtitles to see if everything is correct. There are also other concerns with privacy and the turnaround time, which is not negotiable when you have a tight deadline.

AI-empowered subtitles

AI-assisted transcription is getting highly popular for a number of reasons. This easy way of adding subtitles using an AI platform allows you to be in control of the formatting and the customisation of your video subtitles. You can edit them to have a specific style to match your brand voice and make it sound more like you. Being in charge of your subtitles also enables you to check and edit the transcript to perfection, leaving no room for misinformation. And you don’t have to spend additional time correcting someone else’s work that you paid for. AI platforms like Exemplary AI will do the hard work of transcribing the video for you making the process of adding captions to videos easier and faster.

How to add subtitles to YouTube videos using Exemplary AI

Exemplary AI is a platform that uses generative AI. The web-app is designed to make the process of using AI for content generation; convenient, quick and straightforward. To add subtitles to your YouTube video you can start by creating an account on the Exemplary AI website. You can then upload your video onto the platform and click on “Generate subtitles” to initiate automatic transcription. The transcript of the video can now be downloaded in the subtitles format. The AI model can detect a wide range of languages to produce a transcript in that language.

Translate video subtitles for YouTube

Translation means wider accessibility. Traditionally subtitles came into place to make videos accessible to the hearing impaired and non-native language speakers. If you create video content in your regional language, translating the subtitles to English, for example, can help you reach a bigger global audience. Exemplary AI can detect more than 120 languages and translate it to generate English subtitles for your YouTube videos.

YouTube videos with subtitles increase view time by more than 12%. And since a large number of people depend solely on the subtitles to understand the story or the message of the video, it is crucial that the captions on your video are accurate and the only way to make sure it is accurate is to diy your subtitles. With the help of AI platforms such as Exemplary AI, you can be an efficient creator covering a multitude of advantages with just one action of adding subtitles.

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