How To Add Captions On TikTok

Readers who’ve found this article may be looking for three different sets of instructions.

TikTok uses the word “captions” to describe what TV viewers might think of as “closed captions,” the audio transcriptions of a program’s dialogue and narration. The accessibility feature can be extremely helpful for those with hearing difficulties, those in noisy rooms, and those not fluent in the show’s original language.

However, some people use the word to refer to text that’s placed on a video after it’s been recorded for informational or humorous purposes, and others call the description added to a post along with #hashtags and @mentions a “caption.”

To make sure everyone gets the answer they’re looking for, we’ll explain how to add all three types of captions to your TikTok post.

How To Add Captions on TikTok (Closed Captions)

The easiest method is to use the app’s built-in caption generator.

1. Record your video in the app by pressing the plus sign (+) at the bottom of your home screen, choosing the maximum length of your video (15 seconds, 60 seconds, or 10 minutes) on the bar above the white “record” button, and tapping the button (it will turn red when you select a time limit) to begin filming. Hit the button again to stop recording.
2. When you’re satisfied with the video, tap the checkmark to enter the editing screen and then look for the “Captions” option on the right-hand menu bar. Clicking it opens the captions screen and starts auto-generation of your video’s caption.
3. Once the caption has been created, you can preview the video to make sure you’re happy with it. If not, click the line of text you want to edit, and a keyboard will open for you to type in your changes.
4. Close the editor or click “Next” (which may show as a red arrow on some TikTok versions), and you can post your video.

If you’re not happy with the results of the auto-captioning, you have two more full-featured alternatives.

One is only available if you have a TikTok for Business account (used to advertise on the social media platform). That gives you access to an editor where you can manually add and adjust your own captioning. Otherwise, there are third-party editing apps that let you create captions and upload the finished video to TikTok for posting.

How to Add Captions on TikTok (Text)

There’s actually a third way to add closed captions, and we’ll explain how it works after we discuss adding text to a TikTok video.

1. On the editing screen, tap the “Text” icon.
2. The keyboard that opens lets you type in any text you want to display. You can also choose from a number of fonts as well as text color, type size, and positioning. If you don’t want your text centered, you can choose to left- or right-justify it, and the box where the text appears can be dragged to any part of the screen where you want it to appear. Speech-to-text dictation is also available.
3. If you only want the text to appear for a certain amount of time, you can set the duration and mark the proper starting and ending points on the video timeline at the bottom of the screen. Other options, like overlaying text in various positions, are available as well.
4. When satisfied, tap “Next” and you can post your video.

As you may have guessed, this feature also allows you to type in closed caption text and have it appear almost any way you’d like. It’s a much more complicated process than auto-generation, but it works.

How to Add Captions on TikTok (Descriptions)

This type of caption probably doesn’t need much explanation. Everyone who’s created a TikTok video knows that you’re able to add hashtags, mentions, links — and a description of your content — on the final editing screen that appears before you hit “Post.” That description is what many people call a “caption,” and once you type it into the appropriate box, you’re good to go.