How to Turn On or Off Closed Captioning on Plex

Evan Gower March 10, 2021

With a media server like Plex, you can have all your movies and TV shows on a central server, and then you pipe them via the internet directly to the device you currently have with you.

How to Turn On or Off Closed Captioning on Plex

Turning the subtitles on or off takes some fiddling with the settings to get right, but once you do, it’ll be much easier in the future. You can even set Plex up to download subtitles automatically if they’re not provided.

Sorting Out Your Subtitle Settings

By setting up Plex’s subtitle support properly, you can make it so that you won’t need to fiddle around with the subtitles for your general usage. Here’s how to get it running the way you like it:

Make sure your Plex Media Server application is running.
Connect to your server in your internet browser by going to https://app.plex.tv/desktop or by right-clicking the Plex Media Server taskbar icon and then clicking on Open Plex…
Click on the Settings icon in the upper right-hand corner.
Click on ‘Languages.’
On the next screen, you can use the drop-down menus to choose which language you want Plex to provide subtitles and audio in. You can also choose whether you want the subtitles to always be displayed automatically, or if you want to have manual control over them.
Click on Save Changes.
Next, click on ‘Show Advanced’ in the upper right-hand corner.
Click on ‘Player.’
Here you can change whether Plex will automatically provide subtitles. You can also set a preference for subtitles for hearing-impaired people, as well as decide whether you prefer forced or non-forced subtitles.
Click on Save Changes.

With these settings changes in place, you’ll automatically get the style and language of subtitles you want by default.

How to Turn Subtitles On or Off When Streaming Media

Now that you’ve got your settings sorted, your subtitles will show up by default on every video you watch – or not show up on any video, according to your preference. But you still might need to change whether or not they show up for a particular movie or TV show. Here’s how to switch them on or off when you’re already watching a video:

Start watching the video.
If the top and bottom bars have disappeared, move your cursor to make them show up again.
At the bottom right of the screen, click on the button that looks like an audio mixer, i.e. three vertical bars with dots on them.
Click on ‘Playback Settings.’
This will bring up the playback settings. Click on the dropdown menu next to Subtitles in order to choose which available subtitle track is used, or click on None to switch them off.

And it’s as simple as that. You should have the languages and types of captions you want in the list, and switching them on or off will just take a few clicks.

Frequently Asked Questions

Which subtitle formats are supported in Plex?

Plex supports five subtitle formats. SRT, SMI, SSA, Advanced SubStation Alpha, and VTT formats are all compatible with the service. This is important to know if you have your own Plex Server and would like to input subtitles for your content.

How do I turn off the subtitles on Plex?

Whether you’re using the mobile version of the application, a desktop, or even a set-top box, the instructions for subtitles are nearly identical. All you need to do is make a movement on the screen to pull up the menu. Click the three-dot icon option in the lower right-hand corner and select ‘Playback Settings.’

From here, you can change the Subtitles’ language to none. There may be a slight delay in your video feed, but when it appears again, your subtitles will no longer display on the screen.

I’m Sorry, I Didn’t Hear a Word of That

You might not always be in a situation where you can listen with the sound on, and headphones aren’t always an option. Closed captions and subtitles can make a world of difference, whether you’re hard of hearing, stuck in a loud environment, or trying to watch a foreign language masterpiece.

With this guide, you should be able to easily set your subtitle options up just the way you like them. If you have any other tips and tricks related to getting your captioning set up smartly, feel free to share them with us in the comments below.