What is the difference between SRT and VTT?

Both are timed subtitle files. SRT is the simplest and plays almost everywhere; VTT is the web format and can carry positioning and styling for video on websites.

How do I fix subtitles that are out of sync?

Shift them in the player — in VLC the G and H keys move subtitles earlier or later. If the gap keeps growing, the file was made for a different cut and needs replacing.

Why do Chinese subtitles show as strange characters?

The file's encoding does not match what the player expects. Re-save the file as UTF-8 in a text editor.

SRT, VTT or TXT: which subtitle file you need, and how to get it

Three formats, one job each. What is inside a subtitle file, how to download one from YouTube, and how to fix the two problems everyone hits: bad timing and garbled Chinese.

Subtitle files look technical and are not. Each is plain text you could open in Notepad. The only real decision is which of three formats you want, and that depends on what you are going to do with it.

The three formats

SRT — the one everything plays

SubRip Text. Each line of dialogue is numbered, with a start and end time down to the millisecond, then the words. Nearly every video player on every device reads SRT, which is why it is the default answer when anyone asks for "the subtitles".

VTT — the web's version

WebVTT is SRT's close cousin, built for web video. It can carry position and styling, and it is what browsers use natively. If you are putting captions on a video on a website, you want VTT; for anything else, SRT is simpler.

TXT — just the words

No timings at all: the dialogue as a block of text. Useless for playing back with a video, ideal for reading, quoting, printing or studying a script.

How to download one from YouTube

Trailers, clips, interviews and video essays on YouTube mostly carry caption tracks, and an SRT Downloader will save any of them: paste the video's link, pick the language from the tracks the video offers, choose the format, download. On Transcript.you, TXT is free with an account; SRT and VTT are on the paid plan.

Three limits worth knowing. It needs the video to have captions — none, and there is nothing to download. Private and age-restricted videos are out of reach. And a track labelled auto-generated is speech recognition: good for the gist, unreliable on names, and no substitute for a script.

Streaming services are a different matter. Netflix, Disney+ and the rest keep subtitles inside their own apps and do not offer them as files, even in offline downloads.

Fixing the two usual problems

The subtitles are early or late

Almost always because the file was timed for a different version of the video — a trailer re-cut, a clip with a longer intro. Most players let you shift subtitles without editing the file: in VLC, the G and H keys move them earlier and later in small steps. If the drift grows over time rather than staying constant, the file belongs to a different cut altogether, and no offset will fix it.

Chinese shows up as nonsense characters

That is an encoding mismatch: the file was saved in one character encoding and the player is reading it in another. Opening it in a text editor and saving it again as UTF-8 fixes it in nearly every case.

Why a critic would bother

A timed subtitle file is a scene's dialogue with a stopwatch attached, and a plain-text one is the fastest way to find an exact line — the same habit behind quoting a director interview accurately. For films still in cinemas, every one showing in Hong Kong is here, reviewed.

Common questions

What is the difference between SRT and VTT?: Both are timed subtitle files. SRT is the simplest and plays almost everywhere; VTT is the web format and can carry positioning and styling for video on websites.
How do I fix subtitles that are out of sync?: Shift them in the player — in VLC the G and H keys move subtitles earlier or later. If the gap keeps growing, the file was made for a different cut and needs replacing.
Why do Chinese subtitles show as strange characters?: The file's encoding does not match what the player expects. Re-save the file as UTF-8 in a text editor.