Overview

What is Subtitle Edit?

Subtitle Edit is a free, open-source editor for video subtitles. It allows you to create, edit, adjust, and convert subtitles in a wide variety of formats.

Subtitle Edit 5 is the latest generation, built with Avalonia UI for cross-platform support (Windows, Linux, macOS).

Note: Subtitle Edit 5 is currently in beta testing.

Key Features

• Create and edit subtitles in 300+ formats
• Synchronize subtitles to video with visual tools
• Speech to Text — transcribe audio using Whisper engines
• Text to Speech — generate audio from subtitle text
• Translate subtitles automatically
• OCR — convert image-based subtitles (Blu-ray, DVD, etc.) to text
• Fix common errors automatically
• Spell check with dictionary support
• Burn-in subtitles into video
• Batch convert multiple files
• ASSA/SSA styling with advanced override tags, drawing, and positioning
• Waveform/spectrogram for precise timing
• Shot change detection for professional workflows
• Export to image based subtitles (Blu-ray SUP, BDN-xml, VobSub, etc.)

System Requirements

• Windows 10+ / Linux / macOS
• FFmpeg (for audio/video processing)
• libmpv for video playback

Getting Started

1. Download and install Subtitle Edit
2. Open a video file via Video → Open video file...
3. Open or create a subtitle file via File → Open or File → New
4. Edit subtitles in the text editor and subtitle grid
5. Use the waveform to visually adjust timing
6. Save your work via File → Save

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Main Window Layout

The main window consists of several key areas:

• Menu Bar — Access all features
• Toolbar — Quick access to common actions
• Subtitle Grid — List of all subtitle lines with timing and text
• Text Editor — Edit the currently selected subtitle text
• Video Player — Preview video with subtitles
• Audio Visualizer — Waveform/spectrogram for precise timing adjustments

Subtitle Edit offers 12 different layouts for arranging these areas. You can choose and customize the layout via Options → Choose layout.

For a detailed guide to each area, mouse interactions, and keyboard shortcuts, see the Main Window documentation.

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