Most of the popular Kodi video add-ons are capable of downloading subtitles automatically, but sometimes you need more control over the subtitle selection process to get the right one for your videos.
In this guide, we’ll enable subtitles on Kodi using a couple of add-ons, so you can watch all your shows and movies with subtitles in your preferred language.
1. Set up subtitle preferences on Kodi
Let’s start by setting our preferred language for subtitles and audio.
1. Press the cog icon near the top left corner of the screen. 
2. Open the Player settings.
3. Highlight the Language tab and set your Preferred audio language and Preferred subtitle language. 
Configuring the Preferred audio language ensures that the correct audio track is selected when playing multi-language streams. If English is not your primary language, you should be aware that streams in languages other than English are harder to find.
4. Now highlight the Subtitles tab and set Language to download subtitles for to your preferred language. You can enable multiple languages for subtitles. 
The Default TV show service and Default movie service settings allow you to define your preferred subtitle add-on. Since we have not installed any add-ons yet, we’ll leave these fields empty for now. Please remember to come back and set your preferred subtitle add-ons later.
2. Subtitle add-ons on the official Kodi repository
The official Kodi repository offers a variety of subtitles add-ons for many languages, some of these add-ons require a user account from their respective websites.
Some of our favorite add-ons on the official repository are OpenSubtitles.com, Subscene Subtitles, and Addic7ed. These add-ons offer subtitles in many languages.
OpenSubtitles requires a user account, while the other two do not. Try a couple of add-ons to find which one works best with your preferred languages.
In this guide, we will install Opensubtitles.com, their website offers a large catalog of subtitles in many languages. You must create a free account on Opensubtitles.com to use the add-on.
1. Pressing the cog icon near 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. Now, let’s install some subtitles add-ons. There are many providers, install the ones that suit your language needs.
6. Click on the Install button.
7. Let’s configure the add-on. Open the Context Menu on OpenSubtitles.com and select Settings. (Use a long-press on the remote or the C key on the keyboard to open the context menu).
8. Enter your username and password, and press OK to continue.
3. Using subtitles add-ons en Kodi
Now that we installed and configured the add-ons, we’re ready to use subtitles on Kodi. Let’s start by playing a movie or episode.
1. When playing a video, press the Subtitles button near the bottom-right corner of the screen.
2. Select Download subtitles…
3. Press on one of the installed add-ons and wait a couple of seconds while the search process finishes. Then select a file from the list to download the subtitles.
The video will automatically resume playing as soon as the subtitle file is downloaded.
4. Recommended Kodi subtitle add-ons
a4kSubtitles and SubLoader are two great subtitle add-ons. Both can grab subtitles from a set of popular subtitle websites, they can find subtitles in many languages, and do not require a user account (but you can still use your own OpenSubtitles account for better results).
4.1. Install a4kSubtitles
A4KSubtitles is a great add-on that supports multiple subtitle services like OpenSubtitles, BSPlayer, Podnapisi, Subscene, and Addic7ed.
a4kSubtitles uses the IMDb identifier to find matches for your video, this identifier is usually provided by the streaming add-on as metadata. Luckily, a4kSubtitles works with most modern add-ons.
1. Press the cog icon to open the Settings menu.
2. Press File Manager. 
3. Select Add Source. 
4. Enter https://a4k-openproject.github.io/ on the top box and Addons4Kodi on the bottom one. Press OK to add the source. 
5. Now select Add-ons.
6. Press on Install from zip file. 
7. Select Addons4Kodi. 
8. Click on a4kSubtitles-repository-x.x.zip to install the repository. 
9. Now select Install from repository.
10. Press on Addons4Kodi Repository. 
11. Select Subtitles. 
12. Click on a4KSubtitles. 
13. Press the Install button to install a4kSubtitles on Kodi. 
You’ll see a list of dependencies to be installed along with the add-on, press OK to continue. Now you’re ready to use a4kSubtitles on Kodi.
Check out the add-on’s settings to enable automatic subtitles search, enable/disable subtitle providers, and more.
4.2. Install SubLoader
SubLoader is a service add-on that automatically finds and downloads subtitles for your content with great accuracy. No need to navigate menus, just play your content and SubLoader will do the rest. This add-on is especially useful if you use subtitles often.
SubLoader uses the IMDb number and filename of your video to find the best match. The more descriptive the filename, the better the chances of finding the correct subtitles.
1. Go to SubLoader’s releases page on GitHub and download the latest version of service.subloader-x.x.x.zip. 
Remember the path for the downloaded zip file, we’ll need it in a moment.
2. Open Kodi and press the cog icon to open the Settings menu.
3. Select Add-ons.
4. Press Install from zip file.
5. Locate the recently downloaded zip file and press on it to install SubLoader. 
SubLoader is now installed, but it uses its own language preferences. Let’s open the add-on’s settings and select our preferred language.
6. Select My Add-ons. 
7. Click on Services. 
8. Select SubLoader. 
9. Press the Configure button. 
10. You can choose up to 3 languages on the Subtitles tab. Press OK to save the settings. 
It’s important that you install other subtitle add-ons to use as backup. If SubLoader can’t identify your video, it’ll open the subtitle download dialog and use your other add-ons as fallback.
SubLoader is a fork of AutoSubs. If you’re using AutoSubs please uninstall it to avoid conflicts between the add-ons.
Looking for more add-ons? These are some of our favorite Kodi add-ons for September 2023.
Please visit our list of the best Kodi add-ons for more information.
 | Seren: Excellent add-on with great user interface and many innovative functions. (Premium sources) |
 | Umbrella: Great add-on based on Venom. (Premium sources) |
 | Fen: This add-on is very fast and offers many features. (Premium sources) |
 | Elementum: An exceptional add-on that offers high-quality streams using torrents. (Free sources) |
 | Scrubs: Great add-on specialized in free sources. (Free sources) |
 | The Crew: Great all-in-one add-on with many extra features for kids, sports, live TV, and more. (Free and premium sources) |
I have all that is listed above; however there are times when none of them have a subtitle for the movie I’m watching but on the right the subtitle part of the player says “local subtitles available”. How do you access them and where on Kodi do the movies download to if you are only streaming them with the Crew through real Debrid? I’ve read that the subtitles are stored with the video as an .srt file or some other type of file but can’t find them when I get the local subs available.
why are subtitles not working on kodi 2022
Bom dia acabei de instalar legendas vou verificar
Thank you for the step by step that too in pics. I’m grateful to you for the trouble you’ve taken…
This is the stupidest way to support external subtitles. Using third-party websites via addons which require me to create an account. Because it’s that hard to read them when they are next to the movie like all other softwares do. The subs are not my number one priority but when I need them it’s just stupid to go over this process and the reason why Kodi makes me switch it to another streaming software.
Check ou the new SubLoader addon, is working great.
It actualy auto donwload the best subtitle…
https://www.reddit.com/r/Addons4Kodi/comments/bomkq8/automatic_subtitles_sub_loader/
Thanks for the info! I’m testing Subloader and it’s working perfectly. Subloader add-on automatically downloads the right subtitle for the content playing. Make sure to uninstall Autosubs service to use Subloader.
27.04.2019. There Arne NO Subtitles at the moment. Tryed everyting, Can anybody help
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.