Add subtitles to a video you already have
Pick a file and a language, and ClipHearth adds subtitles on your computer: the file's own, a translation, or AI speech recognition (optional, in the license).
01Optional, and yours to skip
AI subtitles come with the license at no extra cost, and nothing makes you use them. ClipHearth downloads no AI model on its own, and speech recognition runs only when you start a subtitles job or a test yourself. If you would rather not use AI at all, every other tool works exactly the same.
02Open the file
Go to Subtitles and transcript in the sidebar (called AI subtitles up to 1.10.0), or its tile on Home, and click Select file, or drop a video or audio file onto the page. A file in Completed also has a subtitles button in its row (Create or translate subtitles for this file) that opens it here. The card shows the file and which subtitles it already has. For a file with more than one sound track, Sound track picks the one the words are written from; the microphone's track is picked when the file has one, so choose the track with the voice.
03Choose SUBTITLES IN
Pick the language you want to read. Original language (as spoken) keeps what is said, and the language is detected on its own. Sixteen languages are in the main list; nineteen more are marked experimental, because the translation model handles them but we have not checked the results ourselves.
04See where the subtitles will come from
ClipHearth does the least work that gets you there. Subtitles the file already has in your language are used as they are, with no AI. Otherwise existing subtitles are translated, English first. Only when there are none does AI recognise the speech, and translate it if you picked another language. The line above the button says which of these will happen, and Needs with a size means a model still has to be installed.
05Choose OUTPUT
Save a subtitle file next to it writes, for example, film.en.srt beside the video and leaves the video as it is; pick .srt, .vtt for web players, or Both. An audio file always gets one, so the box stays ticked, and the kind you pick applies to it too: with .vtt, talk.m4a gets talk.en.vtt and no .srt. Save the words as text adds what is said as film.en.txt, or .md with the video's name as its heading, and With times starts every paragraph with the moment it is said. Burn into the picture makes a new copy with the subtitles drawn in, for players and sites that ignore subtitle tracks. Add as a track in the video writes the subtitles into the video file itself, as a track named for example English (AI): the picture and sound are not re-encoded, and the file is replaced only after the new copy has been checked. With either of these, a File name field names the new video. Left empty, the copy with burned-in subtitles is called for example film (English subtitles); type another name for the tracks and they go into a new copy with that name while the original video stays as it is.
06Teach it names and terms
Words it should know, below the options, takes names, brands, and terms the speech recognition should spell your way, one per line or separated by commas. Only about the first 400 characters are used, so keep it to the words that matter. The same list is in Settings, and Edit by text uses it too.
07Create subtitles and check the result
Create subtitles adds the job to the Queue, where every step shows as it runs: the model download the first time, preparing the audio, recognising the speech, translating, saving. The saving step and the finished job name the kind of file you chose, for example Save .vtt files and English as .vtt files. You can start before a model is installed; it is installed when the job begins. The job keeps the video's picture in the list, and the finished file shows in Completed with it, also for a file you picked from disk. AI subtitles and translations can contain mistakes, so read them before you rely on them or publish them. If a job fails, Try again runs it once more, and running the same file again replaces the subtitle and text files it made before.
Didn't solve it? Write to us - attach a diagnostics log if you have one. Missing a feature? Tell us what you would use it for; several of the recent ones started as a suggestion.