How to add captions to Facebook Reels
A Facebook reel can get captions three ways: Facebook’s auto-generated captions, the Captions tool in the reels composer, or captions burned into the video before you post. Since June 2025 every video you post to Facebook is a reel, so this covers all of them.
Download on the App StoreWhat burned-in captions look like
Both frames come from the same clip. The right one is the exported file, rendered by the app — not a mock-up.
Does Facebook automatically add captions to videos?
Yes, for reels posted from a Facebook Page or from a profile in professional mode — on a phone, or on a computer through your Page, professional-mode profile or Meta Business Suite. In those cases auto-generated captions are on by default. You can turn them off for all your reels in your Page or profile settings, or for a single reel when you upload it.
In the same settings you can choose to review and edit the captions before viewers see them. Facebook also gives each set of auto-generated captions an accuracy rating, based on things like sound quality, speech clarity and background noise.
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How do I add captions to a Facebook reel?
In the reels composer: after you add your video, tap Captions. Facebook transcribes the audio and puts it on the reel as a caption; you can change its font and colour with the options at the bottom of the composer, then tap Done.
On a computer you can also upload your own captions as a SubRip (.srt) file: open the video, click Options → Edit post → Edit from composer → Add captions, upload the file and save. Repeat for each language you want to add.
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How do I turn on closed captioning on Facebook?
On a computer: click your profile picture → Settings & privacy → Settings → Media, and switch on Always Show Captions. It only applies to videos you watch on a computer.
On iPhone, Facebook follows the system setting: Settings → Accessibility → Subtitles & Captioning → Closed Captions + SDH. The Style option on the same screen changes how captions look; on a computer, Captions Display lets you set the text colour and size and the background colour and opacity.
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Why are captions not showing on Facebook reels?
Not every video on Facebook has captions. Auto-generated captions are only created for reels posted from a Page or a professional-mode profile, the creator can switch them off, and they need spoken dialogue or a voiceover. On the viewer’s side, captions only appear by default if captions are turned on — and the computer setting doesn’t carry over to the app.
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Translated subtitles on Facebook
Facebook can also auto-generate subtitles so viewers watch in their own language. They cover 11 languages — Arabic (Standard), Brazilian Portuguese, English, Hindi, Indonesian, Spanish (Latin America), Tagalog, Tamil, Telugu, Urdu and Vietnamese — and need a reel with spoken dialogue, auto-generated captions turned on, and no burned-in subtitles.
That is the trade-off of burning captions in: the text is part of the picture, looks the same everywhere and can’t be switched off, but a reel with burned-in subtitles doesn’t get Facebook’s translated ones.
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Burn captions into a Facebook reel on iPhone
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Pick the video
Open Subtitled and choose the clip from your camera roll.
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Generate the captions
The app transcribes the speech and times every word. Edit any line if a word came out wrong.
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Choose a style
Karaoke, Highlight and Fill follow the voice word by word; Clean is plain text.
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Post without doubling
Save the video and post it as a reel. Facebook checks every uploaded reel for embedded captions and, if it finds them, recommends deleting its auto-generated ones before you publish — do that, so viewers don’t read the same words twice.
Reel length and format
Facebook reels can be any length, in portrait (9:16), landscape (16:9) or square (1:1). For captions people read on a phone, vertical 9:16 gives the text the most room.
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