Edits captions not working usually means the captions never generated, generated from the wrong audio, or generated but are hidden behind a style or layer problem. Before you retype anything by hand, check four things in order: whether the clip actually has audible speech, whether the captions layer is present and visible, whether the caption style is readable, and whether the export carries the captions. Most caption failures are found in one of those four places.
Captions fail in more ways than most features, because captioning is really three jobs in one: hearing the speech, turning it into text, and displaying that text. A failure in any one of the three looks the same on screen — no captions — but needs a different fix. This guide separates the three jobs, quickest checks first, so you stop redoing work that was never the problem.
The symptom, precisely
Caption failures come in four shapes. The first is no captions at all: the feature runs and produces nothing. That points at missing or unclear speech, or a generation failure. The second is wrong captions: words appear but do not match the speech. That points at unclear audio, heavy accents or noise, or the wrong language setting. The third is captions that exist but do not show: the timeline has them and the export does not. That points at a layer, style, or export problem. The fourth is captions that work in the editor but vanish after sharing: the platform or the handoff is the suspect. Name your shape before you start.
Likely causes, ranked
1. No clear speech for the feature to hear. Silent clips, music-only sections, or speech buried under loud music give the caption engine nothing to transcribe.
2. A hidden or styled-out captions layer. The captions exist but sit behind another layer, use an unreadable colour, or sit off-screen.
3. The wrong language or noisy audio. Captions generated in the wrong language, or from noisy audio, come out wrong rather than missing.
4. An export or sharing problem. Captions that play in the editor but not in the export usually mean the export settings or the sharing path dropped them.
5. A bad build or rollout issue. If captions fail across projects after an update, check our updates page for a known issue.
Fixes, quickest first
Fix 1: Confirm the clip has audible speech. Play the clip and listen: is the speech clear, and is it the loudest thing in the audio? If music or noise drowns it, captions will fail or come out wrong no matter what you do. Our missing audio guide covers silent-clip checks.
Fix 2: Check the captions layer. Confirm the captions layer exists in the timeline, is enabled, and is not hidden behind another layer. Move it to the top of the layer stack and check its style: colour, size, and position.
Fix 3: Regenerate on a clean section. Delete the failed captions for one short, clear-speech section and generate again. If the short section works, the problem was that section’s audio, not the feature. If it fails too, the problem is broader — work the remaining fixes.
Fix 4: Check the language setting. Confirm the caption language matches the spoken language. A mismatch produces confident-looking nonsense, and it is the easiest fix on this page.
Fix 5: Edit the wrong words by hand, then regenerate the rest. Caption engines mishear names, slang, and overlapping speech — that is normal, not a failure. Fix the worst errors manually rather than regenerating the whole timeline, which may mishear different words. Our captions tutorial explains editing and styling in full.
Fix 6: Export a test and check the file, not the preview. If captions show in the editor but not in the export, export a short section and play the file in the phone’s own gallery. If the file has captions, the problem was the player or the sharing path. If the file lacks them, the captions layer or the export settings are the cause — re-check the layer before anything else.
Caption problems in a desktop workflow
Desktop workflows add one more caption trap: the review screen. Captions that look fine on a phone preview can sit off-screen or unreadable on a larger display, and captions judged on a computer monitor may be styled for the wrong frame. Check captions at the size and frame your audience will see, on the phone, before concluding they failed. In an emulator, caption generation can also stall if the emulator’s audio routing is off — if generation fails only in the emulator, test the same clip on the phone. Our PC routes guide covers the emulator trade-offs.
When it is a rollout or server issue
Caption generation that fails across every project, on clear speech, and started the same day for other editors is usually a bad build or a server-side problem — caption generation often depends on server processing. The tell is universality: nothing local explains why a clear, loud, single-speaker test clip produces nothing. In that case the genuine fix is checking our updates page and waiting for the next build. We do not invent error codes or Meta statements, and we do not dress up waiting as a technical fix — but when the cause is server-side, waiting is the fix, and regenerating the same captions ten times only wastes your evening.
Mistakes to avoid
The biggest mistake is retyping all captions by hand before checking whether the layer is simply hidden or the language is wrong — both are one-tap fixes. The second is regenerating the whole timeline to fix a handful of wrong words, which trades known errors for unknown ones. The third is judging captions in a sharing preview rather than in the exported file: previews and platforms strip or restyle captions, and the file itself is the truth.
Frequently asked questions
Why are my Edits captions not showing up?
Check that the captions layer exists, is enabled, and is not hidden behind another layer, and that its style is readable. Then export a test and check the file itself.
Why are my Edits captions wrong?
Usually noisy audio, overlapping speech, or the wrong language setting. Confirm the language matches the spoken language, then fix the worst words by hand.
Why do captions work in the editor but not in the export?
The captions layer or the export settings are the likeliest cause. Export a short test and play it in the phone’s own gallery to confirm.
Can Edits caption music-only sections?
No. Caption generation needs audible speech. Music-only sections produce nothing, and that is expected, not a failure.
Why do captions vanish after sharing?
Platforms and sharing paths restyle or strip captions. Judge the exported file itself before concluding the captions failed.
What if captions fail on every project?
That points at the build or the server side. Check the updates page for a known issue and wait for the next version.
More help: browse every problem in our help hub, or start with our missing audio guide if the clip itself has no sound.
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Making captions accurate in the first place
Most wrong captions are decided before generation starts, in how the audio was recorded. Speech recorded close to the phone, in a quiet room, with no music underneath transcribes far more accurately than speech recorded across a room over a soundtrack. If you can, record dialogue separately from music, and add the music afterwards — the caption engine then hears clean speech, and you keep full control of the mix. When speech and music must share a track, keep the music low under dialogue and avoid overlapping voices: two people talking at once is the single hardest case for any caption engine, and even a perfect feature will guess. A minute spent on clean audio saves ten minutes of hand-correcting captions later.
Styling captions so they survive sharing
Captions that look good in the editor can still fail your audience if the style does not survive the journey. Use a high-contrast combination — light text on a dark backing is the safest — and keep the text large enough to read on a phone held at arm’s length. Keep captions inside the safe area, away from the edges where platforms crop or overlay their own interface. And test the exported file on the platform itself, not only in the gallery: a caption style that survives export can still be restyled by a platform, and knowing that before you publish lets you choose a style that holds up. Captions are an accessibility feature first and a style choice second, so readability beats decoration every time.
When captions are out of sync
Captions that show the right words at the wrong time are a different failure from missing or wrong captions, and they have their own causes. The most common is a timeline shift: clips trimmed, moved, or split after captions were generated leave the captions sitting where the speech used to be. If captions drift progressively worse through a project, the timeline changed after generation — regenerate the captions for the affected section rather than dragging individual lines back into place, because dragging fixes one line and leaves the rest drifting. If captions are uniformly early or late by a small amount, the cause is usually the export or the player rather than the timeline: check the exported file in the phone’s own gallery before re-editing. And if captions sync in the editor but not on a platform, the platform’s player is the suspect, not Edits — the exported file is the truth, and a platform that plays it out of sync will do the same to any editor’s captions.
One habit ties all of this together: after every caption pass, watch the video once through with the sound off. If the captions alone tell the story — right words, right timing, readable style — they will work for every viewer, including the many who watch without sound. If they do not, you have found the problem while it is still cheap to fix, not after publishing.