The difference in one table
| Burned-in (open) captions | Closed captions (subtitle file) | |
|---|---|---|
| Where they live | In the video's pixels | In a separate SRT or VTT file |
| Can viewers turn them off? | No | Yes |
| Your style and animation | Yes, any font, colour and motion | No, the player's own style |
| Survive downloads and reposts | Yes | Only if the file goes too |
| Searchable text | No | Yes, on platforms that read the file |
| Several languages on one video | One per video file | One file per language |
Which platforms take subtitle files
YouTube, Facebook and LinkedIn let you upload a subtitle file to a video, so viewers can switch captions on. Instagram Reels and TikTok don't take subtitle files for normal posts: there, captions must be in the video or added with the app's own caption feature.
That's why short-video creators burn captions in: it's the only way to control how they look on Reels and TikTok, and the captions stay when a video is reposted across platforms.
When to use burned-in captions
- Reels, TikTok and Shorts, where most people watch with the sound off and the captions are part of the style.
- Ads and promos, where you need the message seen exactly as designed.
- Clips that will be downloaded, shared in chats or reposted.
CAPWAV's burn subtitles into video tool writes the captions from the speech, lets you style and correct them, and burns them in as it exports, in your browser.
When to use closed captions
- Long YouTube videos, courses and webinars, where viewers choose captions and languages.
- Accessibility requirements that ask for captions the viewer can switch on.
- Several languages on one video: one subtitle file per language.
Every CAPWAV project can be downloaded as SRT, VTT or TXT on every plan, free. Need another format? The free subtitle converter turns SRT into VTT and back. SRT vs VTT explains the two formats.
Captions and accessibility
Captions matter most to viewers who are deaf or hard of hearing. Closed captions let those viewers use their own settings, such as text size and colour, on platforms that support it; burned-in captions can't be changed by the viewer, so make them large and high-contrast.
- Caption all the speech, not only the highlights.
- Keep each caption on screen long enough to read: short lines, in step with the speech.
- Use strong contrast: an outline, shadow or box behind light text.
- Check the words: names and technical terms are where automatic transcription most often slips. In CAPWAV you can correct any word before exporting.
Doing both
For YouTube, the strongest setup is both: a video with styled captions burned in, plus the same captions uploaded as a subtitle file. Viewers see the captions either way, and the platform gets the text.