Add text to a video
Put a line of text over the picture. Pick where it sits, how big it is and whether it needs something behind it.
- Free
- Runs on your device
- No account
- No limits
One file at a time. The video is edited on your own device, so nothing is uploaded and there's no size limit beyond what your browser can hold.
How to add text to a video
- Drop a video in the box above.
- Type your text and set the size, the colour and where on the frame it sits.
- Download. The file keeps its name and its format, with -text added.
- The first video also fetches the video engine, about 7MB, which your browser then keeps. After that it starts straight away.
About adding text to video here
The text is drawn into the picture itself, so it shows in any player and survives being uploaded anywhere. That's the difference between this and a subtitle file, which is a separate thing a player can choose to display, translate or ignore.
A caption over a moving picture is often unreadable without something behind it, because the frame underneath changes from bright to dark while the text stays one colour. The backing box is there for exactly that and costs nothing. The face is Roboto Bold, shipped with the page, since there are no system fonts inside a browser sandbox to borrow.
This edit changes the picture, so every frame has to be decoded and encoded again. Your own machine does that work, which is what keeps the file off anybody's server, and it's why a long clip takes longer than a short one. Trimming and removing the sound are the two things here that skip it entirely.
Common questions
Is the add text to a video free?
Yes, properly free. No paid tier, no trial, no watermark on the result and nothing to sign up for. Put as many files through it as you like, as often as you like.
Are my files uploaded to a server?
No. The add text to a video runs inside your browser, on your own machine, so your files never go anywhere. Big ones are fine too, up to whatever your browser can hold.
Is the text burned into the video or a separate subtitle?
It's drawn into the frames themselves, which means it appears in every player and survives being uploaded to anywhere that re-encodes the file. The trade is that it cannot be turned off, translated or restyled afterwards. A subtitle file keeps those options but has to travel alongside the video and be understood by whatever plays it.
Why does my caption disappear over bright parts of the video?
Because the text is one fixed colour and the picture underneath is not. White text vanishes over a bright sky and black text vanishes in shadow, and over a moving clip it's usually both at different moments. Turning on the backing box puts a half transparent panel behind the words, which keeps them readable no matter what passes underneath.