Add captions to your screen recording — in any language.
Captions make your recordings accessible, boost engagement, and help international teams follow along. Here's how to add them without uploading to a third-party service.
Why captions matter
Accessibility
Viewers who are deaf or hard of hearing depend on captions. Many organizations require them for compliance with WCAG and ADA guidelines.
SEO and discoverability
Search engines can't watch video, but they can index caption text. Adding captions makes your tutorials and demos findable.
International teams
Not everyone on your team speaks the same language. Translated captions let you share one recording with colleagues across regions.
Engagement
Most social and internal videos are watched on mute. Captions keep viewers watching when they can't — or won't — turn on sound.
External tools vs. built-in captions
Cloud-based editors (VEED, Descript, Kapwing)
Upload your recording to the cloud, wait for transcription, edit captions in a browser, then download the result. It works, but you're adding a separate workflow, paying for another subscription, and sending your content through someone else's servers.
Manual SRT files
You can write subtitle files by hand or use a free transcription service, then attach them in your video player. Accurate, but painfully slow — especially for long recordings or multiple languages.
Built-in with Notch
Notch lets you create captions directly inside the app — no upload, no separate editor, no extra subscription. Add multiple language tracks and export each as SRT.
How to add captions in Notch
Three steps from recording to captioned export. No external tools required.
Create captions
Open your recording in Notch and click Captions in the toolbar. Add time-synced subtitles to your recording.
Add more languages
Need captions in Spanish, French, German, or another language? Create a separate caption track for each language. Notch keeps timestamps in sync across all tracks.
Choose your export format
Export with captions burned into the video, or as a separate SRT file you can attach in any player. You can also export both at once — burned-in for social media, SRT for your LMS or documentation site.
SRT vs. burned-in captions
SRT (sidecar file)
- ✓Viewer can toggle captions on or off
- ✓Easy to update or fix typos without re-exporting the video
- ✓Multiple language tracks from one video file
- •Best for: YouTube, LMS platforms, documentation sites, internal wikis
Burned-in (hardcoded)
- ✓Captions always visible — no player support needed
- ✓Works on any platform, including social media autoplay
- ✓Single file to share — nothing to attach or configure
- •Best for: Slack, Twitter/X, LinkedIn, email attachments, quick demos
Captions, built in.
Download Notch and add captions to your next screen recording. Free to use, no account required.
Download Notch