Some popular video addons for Kodi already have automatic subtitles capabilities and that’s great, but some times you need more control over your selection process to get the right subtitles for your video. In this guide we’ll enable subtitles on Kodi using a couple of addons so you can watch all your shows and movies on Kodi with subtitles in any language.
Table of contents
Install subtitles addons on Kodi
1. Open the System menu by pressing the cog icon on the top left corner of the Home Screen. 
2. Select Add-ons.
3. Select Install from Repository. 
4. Click on Subtitles. (If you’ve installed 3rd party repositories on your system you’ll have to select the official Kodi Add-on Repository first).
5. Let’s install some subtitles add-ons. There are many providers, install the ones that suits your language needs. OpenSubtiles and Subscene are great for subtitles in English and many other languages.
If you want to install the official OpenSubtitles addon read the instructions at the end of this tutorial. 
6. Click on the Install button. 
Set up subtitles preferences on Kodi
Now that we installed a couple of add-ons for subtitles let’s set up the preferred language and default add-on for subtitles.
7. Go back to the Home Screen and open Settings by clicking the gear icon near the bottom-left corner.
8. Open the Player settings. 
9. Highlight the Language tab and click on Language to download subtitles for.
10. You can select more than one language. Select your preferred languages and click OK to confirm.
11. Now set the Default TV show service and Default movie service to one of the subtitles addons installed earlier.
12. You’re ready to go. When playing a video press the Subtitles button near the bottom right corner of the screen.
13. Select Download subtitles… 
14. Select a file to download the subtitles. 
[Optional] How to enable automatic subtitles on Kodi with Autosubs
If you use subtitles often you may find that clicking on Subtitles > Download every time you start a video can be a bit annoying. Lets solve that by installing the Autosubs service.
15. Go to the Home Screen and click on the Add-ons tab.
16. Select Addon Browser. 
17. Then select Install from repository.
18. Click on Services. (If you’ve installed 3rd party repositories you’ll have to select the official Kodi Add-on Repository first)
19. Select Autosubs.
20. Press Install. 
21. Now that Autosubs is installed the Subtitle Selection Dialog will automatically open when you start playing a video.
When choosing a subtitles file keep in mind the video quality and try to match it with the subtitle file name, this way you’ll have better chances of getting the right subtitles for your video. Most addons scrapping file locker websites for sources will show a truncated filename which makes finding the right subtitle harder.
How to install the official OpenSubtitles addon
OpenSubtitles.org has its own addon for Kodi called OpenSubtitles by OpenSubtitles. This addon doesn’t require authentication and it gives you access to their extensive collection of subtitles in several languages.
I. Download the addon from its GitHub page, remember the downloaded file’s location. 
II. Open the System menu by pressing the cog icon on the top left corner of the Home Screen.
III. Select Add-ons.
IV. Select Install from zip file. 
V. Locate the zip file we just downloaded and click on it to install the add-on. 
If you want to set the official OpenSubtitles Kodi addon as the default subtitles addon follow the instructions on step 11.
If you have problems with the OpenSubtitles add-on please visit the OpenSubtitles add-on thread on their official forum.
These are some of the most popular Kodi add-ons for March 2019:
- Exodus Redux: Based on Exodus, it uses OpenScrapers to get sources from file hosting websites.
- Yoda: Based on Exodus, scrapes sources from file hosting websites.
- Seren: New add-on written from scratch with very innovative features like playing next episodes automatically, requires Debrid and Trakt accounts.
- Elementum: High quality videos using Torrents.
- Plexus: Live sports using AceStream or SopCast.
Is there a way to save a particular subtitle and its offset on a particular movie file I have on my server, or do I have to go through the process every time of downloading the subtitle, figuring out the offset, setting the offset… there should be a way for Kodi to remember the subtitle that goes with a filename, no?
subtitles just stopped working on Kodi firestick a couple days ago, and on my girlfriend’s too. Just get error msg. What’s up? Worked fine for weeks.
Hi, which addon are you using for subtitles?
Subtitles for live tv … how to enable
Downloading subtitles for live streams is not possible. Check if your stream has closed caption (CC)
Is it possible to view subtitles on live TV?
thank you
Now that I have installed subtitles, how can I uninstall them as I hate them
Uninstall Autosubs service and you won’t get the subtitle selection screen when starting a video. Sometimes videos have built-in subs, there’s no way to remove those.
I thought everyone reading this should know that OpenSubtitles made a custom version of the add-on that works without login. Just search “subtitles by opensubtitles” on Google and find the result from github.com. You can then find the green download as zip button and load this into Kodi via Settings > Add-ons > Install from zip.
Here’s the link hopefully it works:
https://github.com/opensubtitles/service.subtitles.opensubtitles_by_opensubtitles
Hi Joe, thanks for letting us know. I’ll update the guide to reflect the new changes.
Yes and leaving a credit card details just to get subtitles stopped me registering.
Opensubtitles does not ask for credit card info, just email. Check if you are using the correct URL.