Subtitles for a screen you don't control
You bring a subtitle file. Subtitlezz plays it on your phone, in time with whatever is on the screen in front of you, and you nudge it when it drifts.
When you would use it
The common case is a cinema that runs no captioned screenings at all. The other is subtitles that exist in the wrong language: a Berlin cinema showing an English-language film with German subtitles is no use to someone who reads Italian and not German.
Anywhere the picture is fixed and the captions are not yours to change:
- A cinema screening with no captions, or captions you can't read.
- A seat-back screen on a flight.
- A hotel television, a bar, a waiting room.
- A film projected from someone else's laptop.
The file you need
Subtitlezz reads .srt and .vtt files. Load one
from your phone, or search for one inside the app and load it directly.
Match the runtime, not the title. A subtitle timed against a 142 minute cut drifts steadily against a 138 minute one, and nudging cannot fix a gap that keeps growing. Theatrical and extended cuts need different files.
Starting it on cue
Press play on the first line of dialogue rather than on the studio logos. Check it against a line you can hear or lip-read, then leave it alone.
On a keyboard: space plays and pauses, ← and → seek five seconds, ↑ and ↓ step one line, and F goes fullscreen.
When it drifts
If the whole track sits ahead or behind, step it one line at a time until it lines up again. The scrubber makes larger jumps, which is what you want if you arrived late and need to cover ten minutes at once.
Nothing corrects itself in the background. Timing only changes when you change it, so a track that is right stays right.
Reading it in a dark room
Text is white on black with no bright surfaces, and the controls fade out once playback starts. The screen is kept awake while subtitles are running, so the phone will not lock in the middle of a scene.
The face is Atkinson Hyperlegible, drawn for the Braille Institute to keep letters apart for low-vision readers. Capital I, lowercase l and the digit 1 stay separable at a glance, which is the whole job when you are reading one line in the dark and looking back up.
Where your file goes
Nowhere. The file is read in your browser and stays there. There is no account and no server that receives your subtitles. Your position is saved on the device, so closing the tab by accident during a film does not lose your place, and once the page has loaded it runs with no signal.
Questions
Can I use my phone for subtitles in a cinema?
Yes, and it is the reason this exists. Hold the phone low, in your lap or against your chest, so the light falls on you and not on the row behind. Subtitlezz draws white text on black with no bright surfaces for exactly this reason.
Is it rude to use a phone during a film?
A bright screen held up at chest height is. A dim one in your lap, on a fixed page that never flashes a notification, is what accessibility looks like in a room that did not provide any. If you are worried, tell an usher before the film starts.
Does Subtitlezz need to hear the film?
No. There is no microphone and no speech recognition. It does not listen, transcribe or translate: it plays a file you supply, on a clock you control. That is why it works in a cinema, where a phone microphone would hear the room rather than the screen.
Does it work on iPhone and Android?
Both. It is a web page, not an app, so there is nothing to install from a store and no account to make. Open it in Safari or Chrome and add it to your home screen if you want it to launch full screen.
Can I use it for streaming at home?
Yes, though it is rarely the easiest option. If the film is on your own television or laptop you can usually load a subtitle file into the player itself. Subtitlezz earns its place when the screen belongs to someone else.
Does it work without an internet connection?
Yes. Load the page and your file before you go in, and it will run with no signal for the rest of the screening. This is the normal case, not the edge case: most auditoriums have no reception at all.
Does it cost anything, and do I need an account?
No to both. No sign-in, no payment, no trial that expires. Nobody is billed for reading a film they already bought a ticket to.