SRT Subtitle Formatter — Transcript to .SRT / .VTT
Paste a plain or time-stamped transcript and download a properly timed, line-wrapped .SRT or .VTT subtitle file — entirely in your browser.
In short
An SRT file is a numbered list of cues, each with a start and end time in hh:mm:ss,mmm --> hh:mm:ss,mmm format followed by one or two lines of text of up to about 42 characters. Captions should stay on screen at least 1 second and are timed at roughly 160 words per minute when no time stamps exist.
Who this is for: Podcasters, YouTubers and course creators turning a transcript into subtitles for YouTube, Vimeo, Premiere or a website.
How the transcript is timed and wrapped
- Time-stamped input (most podcast, Zoom, Otter and YouTube transcript exports): each stamp becomes a caption start; the caption ends 0.1 s before the next stamp. A long segment is split into several captions and the time is shared out in proportion to the words in each.
- Plain text: captions are timed by reading speed — 160 words per minute is a comfortable default for English; use 130–140 for Urdu or Arabic, or for viewers reading a second language.
- Line length: 42 characters is the broadcast norm (Netflix uses 42; BBC 37 for some services). Two lines per caption is the maximum most guidelines allow.
- Minimum duration: captions shorter than about 1 second flash and cannot be read; 1.2 s is a safe floor.
SRT is accepted by YouTube, Vimeo, Premiere, DaVinci Resolve, VLC and almost every player. WebVTT is the format for HTML5 <track> elements on your own website and for some LMS platforms.
See also: TikTok & YouTube RPM Calculator.
Assumptions
- Lines beginning with mm:ss or hh:mm:ss (optionally in brackets) are used as start times; a cue ends 0.1 s before the next stamp.
- Plain text is timed at the chosen words-per-minute rate with a minimum cue duration.
- Wrapping is by character count per line and lines per cue; long stamped segments are split proportionally to word count.
Worked example
Input:
00:00 Welcome to the show.
00:04 Today we look at UAE gratuity rules.
00:11 Let's start with who qualifies.
Output: caption 1 runs 00:00:00,000 → 00:00:03,900; caption 2 runs 00:00:04,000 → 00:00:10,900; caption 3 has no following stamp, so it lasts the longer of 1.2 s and its word count at 160 wpm.
Frequently asked questions
My transcript has speaker names — will they be kept?
Yes, they stay in the text. Delete them first if you do not want them on screen; most subtitle guidelines only show speaker labels when the speaker is off-camera.
Can I upload the SRT to YouTube?
Yes: YouTube Studio → Subtitles → Add → Upload file → 'With timing'. If your plain-text timing drifts, upload as 'Without timing' instead and YouTube will auto-sync it to the audio.
Why do the timings in plain-text mode not match my audio?
Without stamps the tool can only estimate from reading speed. Adjust the words-per-minute value, or paste a stamped transcript from your recording app for accurate timing.
Does it handle Urdu or Arabic text?
Yes — right-to-left text is wrapped by character count and written as UTF-8, which YouTube and modern players read correctly. Older players may need the file re-saved with a BOM.
Related calculators
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