About
Captions primarily convey dialogue and other relevant audio information, making videos accessible to individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing, or for viewers who prefer to watch videos without sound. They're typically in the same language as the video, and are important for viewers who are deaf, hard of hearing, or prefer watching without sound. It's important not to confuse them with subtitles, which are a translation of the video's dialogue into another language. For information on ordering subtitles, check out our article Ordering Translations.
This article explains how to order captions and view caption requests via Kaltura's Video Portal.
Captioning options
Kaltura provides two options for captioning:
Professional: This service uses human transcribers to provide full-service captioning with 99% accuracy, meeting Closed Captions laws and media standards. Turnaround time varies (3-48 hours) based on your REACH plan. Ideal for public-facing content like marketing, learning, and training videos.
Machine: Also known as ASR, this service achieves an average accuracy of 85% and a turnaround time of up to 2 hours. It enables searchable video content, transcript editing, and resubmission for alignment. The machine engine improves over time and supports custom vocabularies for enhanced accuracy, along with dictionary use. Check out our article Reach profiles and services for more information.
Access the Caption & Enrich service
- Select My Media from the video portal user menu.
- Check the box(es) next to the desired video(s), then select Caption & Enrich from the Actions menu.
The My Media page displays.
The Order Captions & Enrichment Services screen displays.
Ordering can also be done for a single video from the Actions menu on that video's Media Page, as shown below:
Order captions
Machine
- Complete the following fields:
- Service - Select 'Machine'.
- Source Media Language - Select the source media language from the drop-down menu. The options in the menu are dependent on your REACH plan.
- Feature - Select 'Captions'.
- Click Submit.
A confirmation message displays: Your request has been received. Your video will automatically be updated upon completion.
The order displays at the top of the screen.
Professional
- Complete the following fields:
- Service - Select 'Professional'.
- Source Media Language - Select the source media language from the drop down menu (this is the language the video is currently in). The options in the drop-down menu are dependent on your REACH plan.
- Feature - Select 'Captions'.
- Turnaround time - Select the turnaround time from the drop-down menu. The turnaround time options available in the menu are dependent on your REACH plan.
- Speaker Names - (Optional) Check to add the speaker's name(s) at the beginning of the captions. This feature must be enabled by your system administrator.
- Instructions & Notes - (Optional) This box is relevant for professional captions only, and is used for adding notes for the attention of human editors and reviewers.
The general best practice for Instructions & Notes is to use them for unique terminology and names that are relevant for that file, and not, for example, a 1,000-word glossary. In addition, comments like "Please pay extra attention to the following X, Y, Z in the first five minutes of the video..." aren't effective because transcribers typically receive only portions of the file.
2. Click Submit.
A confirmation message displays: Your request has been received. Your video will automatically be updated upon completion.
The order displays at the top of the screen.
View orders
Exiting requests
If there are no existing requests, a message displays: No requests were found.
If there are existing requests, they are displayed in the Existing Requests section. (Clicking +Order will take you to the Order Captions & Enrichment Services section to create another order.)
Status types
The following statuses are available for captions requests:
- Pending - when generating new request
- Pending for Moderation - requests in approval queue
- Rejected - requests that were rejected on moderation. This status must include reject reason.
- Processing - sent to the vendor and vendor received request
You cannot cancel a request when the status is Processing - Ready - when caption was received back from the vendor
- Error - an error was sent from the vendor. This status includes the reason for rejection.
- Aborted
Use the arrow at the side of the request to display more details about the order.
Duplicated requests
If you submit and identical order to one that exists, the following message is displayed: 'Service was already done for this video. Are you sure you want to resubmit?' 
Cancel request
To cancel a Pending request, click on the trash can icon in the request line. Note, any action items associated with the request will be canceled.
A confirmation message is displayed to confirm your selection.
If you try to delete a request that's already in progress, a message displays: The request is already in progress, therefore cannot be canceled.
View the captions
When the captions are ready, they are automatically added to the media. Depending on your administrator's configuration, a toggle CC button may appear on the bottom bar, allowing you to instantly show or hide default captions. The administrator can also choose whether to have captions displayed on the player by default when the user starts playing the video.
Users can access different caption languages, if available, by using the captions sub-menu within the settings menu.
To learn more about how captions display on the player, visit our articles Captions and Audio Tracks and Accessibility.
Tags are automatically added to the video when captions are added. To learn how to edit the tags and other metadata, visit our article Media Metada.
