Subtitles and languages
Extended Language Support Is Coming to Video Download Helper! 🌍
Version 10.5 includes, when available at the source, support for audio track selection as well as subtitles! A new icon will display the subtitles availability for the detected media.
A Few Things to Note
We do not generate audio tracks in any language we merely allow you to control which audio track is downloaded. If the video provider allows you to select a language, we try our best to reflect this selection and provide you with your preferred pick.
We also do not generate subtitles for videos just like with audio tracks, we merely provide you with the ability to download media with a subtitle track that matches your preference.
How Do I Choose Which Language Is Downloaded?
With this version, we've introduced a new widget, available in the Settings tab:
⚠️ The Preferred audio tracks module is hidden if Prefer original audio is checked.
This setup provides a set list of available languages for you to pick and match from.
- Build your preference list by selecting a language in the list and clicking Add languages.
- Each language you add is placed in the top list.
- The order matters: we try to match the source media options against your list, from top to bottom.
What does this mean in practice?
If your picked list is the following:
Portuguese (PT) → Spanish (ES) → French (FR) → English (EN)
And the media provides these language options (in any order):
French (FR), Italian (IT), Japanese (JP)
➡️ The selected language will be French (FR), not Portuguese or Spanish.
Subtitle and Audio Selection Are Independent
What does this mean in practice?
If your picked list is the following:
Portuguese (PT) → Spanish (ES) → French (FR) → English (EN)
And the media provides the following audio selection:
Estonian (ET), Polish (PL), Spanish (ES), English (EN)
And the following subtitles selection:
English (EN), French (FR), Italian (IT), Spanish (ES), Portuguese (PT)
➡️ The media you download will have the Spanish (ES) audio track and the Portuguese (PT) subtitle track.
Supported Sites
Right now, only YouTube is supported. Extended support is coming at a later date, but will work the same way.
Known Limitations
- Each downloaded media will only include one subtitle track, not every available track. If you want multiple subtitles for the same media, you will have to download the media multiple times.
- You cannot download the subtitle track standalone.
- Subtitles are selected at download, so changing the settings after detection will be reflected in the downloaded media. This means you can download the same media multiple times once it is detected, if you want multiple subtitle tracks available.
- Audio tracks are selected at detection, meaning that to reflect changes made to the audio track picker, you will have to refresh the web page to re-detect the media.
Known Issues
- ⚠️ There is an ongoing problem with YouTube where only the default audio track is available. Sadly, this means that right now the audio track picker does not affect the downloaded media.
Supported languages
Please see here.