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Add your captions to YouTube

Who this guide is for

Creators whose captions are ready and who want them on their YouTube video without downloading and uploading a file.

Prerequisites

  • A paid video whose status is Ready to review or Done.
  • The same video already uploaded to your YouTube channel. It can be public, unlisted or private.
  • The Google account that owns that YouTube channel.

Step-by-step instructions

Where to find it: Videos › <video title>

Connect YouTube

  1. Select Videos in the app menu, then select your video. The page says Your captions are ready.
  2. Select Add to YouTube.
  3. Select Connect YouTube. A Google window opens.
  4. Choose the Google account that owns your channel. If your channel is a brand channel, choose it when Google asks.
  5. Google asks you to let Captionr manage your YouTube videos. Select Allow. The page shows Channel: and your channel's name.

Choose the video and the captions

  1. Under 1. Choose the YouTube video, find your video in the list. Type part of its title in Search your videos to find it faster, or select Show more to see older videos.
  2. Select the video. To pick a different one, select Change.
  3. Under 2. Choose the captions, tick the captions you want:
    • English captions: the translation. Ticked for you.
    • Arabic captions (original), or the name of your video's language: what was said, in the original language.
  4. Under each one, the page says whether it will be Added as "English" or whether it Replaces captions with the same name that are already on the video.
  5. Select Add to YouTube. The button shows Sending.

Important: If you already added captions named, for example, English to the video yourself, they are replaced. YouTube's automatic captions are never touched.

Expected result

The page says Done and names your video. Select Open in YouTube Studio to see the captions there, or Watch on YouTube to watch the video. Viewers turn the captions on with the CC button. YouTube can take a few minutes to show them.

Common questions / troubleshooting

My video is not in the list. Make sure you connected the account that owns the channel: select Use another account. If you uploaded the video to YouTube a moment ago, select Refresh.

The page says this Google account has no YouTube channel. You chose a Google account without a channel, or the personal account instead of a brand channel. Select Connect YouTube again and choose the channel.

The Google window did not open. Your browser blocked it. Allow popups for captionr.app and try again.

Google says the app is not verified. Captionr is finishing Google's review of YouTube access. Until then, download the file and add it in YouTube Studio: see Download your captions.

The page says my YouTube connection has ended. For your safety the connection lasts about an hour and ends when you leave the page. Select Connect YouTube again.

YouTube is not taking more captions today. YouTube limits how many caption files apps can send each day. Try again tomorrow, or download the file and add it in YouTube Studio.

Can I still add captions after my video file was deleted? Yes. Captions are sent without the video file, until the Kept until date in Details.

Can I add the captions to a second video? Yes. After Done, select Send to another video.

How do I remove Captionr's access to YouTube? Select Disconnect on the video page, or remove Captionr in your Google account under Security › Third-party apps with account access.

Keywords: YouTube, add captions, upload captions, subtitles, CC, closed captions, send to YouTube, YouTube Studio, channel, brand account, connect YouTube, SRT