Captions, in whatever format you need
Subtitles come in more than one format, and the one you have is rarely the one you need. Download captions from one place and you get an .srt file; try to add them to a website and it demands .vtt; hand them to a colleague and they just want the words. This free converter turns subtitles between SubRip (.srt), WebVTT (.vtt) and a plain-text transcript in one step, and shifts the timing if the captions are out of sync. It all runs in your browser, so nothing you upload leaves your device.
What it does
- Converts both ways: SRT to VTT and VTT to SRT, detected automatically.
- Exports a transcript: just the spoken words, with numbers, timings and tags removed.
- Fixes sync: shift every caption earlier or later by a set number of seconds.
SRT or VTT, and why it matters
SubRip (.srt) is the most common subtitle format and works with most desktop players and editing tools. WebVTT (.vtt) is what the web uses: to add captions to a video on a page with the HTML5 track element, they must be VTT. The formats are almost identical, the main differences being that SRT separates milliseconds with a comma while VTT uses a full stop and opens with a WEBVTT header, so converting between them is safe and lossless for both the text and the timings. This tool does the fiddly reformatting so you do not have to.
Why captions are worth getting right
Captions are not just a nice extra. They make video accessible to deaf and hard-of-hearing viewers, which is a requirement under WCAG and laws like the European Accessibility Act. They also help the huge number of people who watch with the sound off, learners, non-native speakers, and anyone in a noisy or quiet place. And because search engines can read a transcript but not a soundtrack, captions make your video content findable. Converting your captions into the right format is the small step that unlocks all of that.
Private, and part of a bigger toolkit
Subtitle files can contain unreleased or sensitive material, so this converter never uploads them: the parsing and conversion happen entirely in your browser. If you are working on accessibility more broadly, pair it with our WCAG 2.2 AA checklist, the colour contrast checker and the alt text checker to cover the rest of the ground. It is free, needs no signup, and there is no limit on how many files you convert.