Zoom, a popular video teleconferencing service, has delivered on its promise to offer auto-generated closed captions to all free Zoom meetings accounts, making the service more accessible.
Zoom’s auto-generated subtitles are currently only available in English, but the business has stated that it hopes to expand to other languages in the future.
Zoom’s auto-generated subtitles are currently only available in English, but the business has stated that it hopes to expand to other languages in the future.
“It’s important to us that everyone can successfully connect, communicate, and participate using Zoom,” said Theresa Larkin, the company’s product marketing manager of meetings and chat.
“Without the proper accessibility tools, people with disabilities face tremendous barriers when using video communication solutions,” Theresa added.
Zoom had previously confined AI-powered live transcription to its paying accounts, which sparked criticism from accessibility advocates who pointed out that the pandemic’s widespread usage of Zoom calls left deaf individuals with few options.
Zoom conference hosts have to either use a third-party captioning provider or manually add their own captions without the auto-captions.
Over the last year, the company has introduced more accessibility features, such as support for screen readers and the ability to display multiple videos at once, as well as the ability to keep a sign language interpreter visible at all times, even when another user on the call is speaking.
To enable captions in Zoom meetings, an account owner or a user with admin credentials can sign into the Zoom web portal and navigate to ‘account administration’ in the navigation menu. Select ‘account settings,’ then the ‘meetings’ tab. According to The Verge, change the closed captioning option under ‘in meeting (advanced)’ to enable it.
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