Are you looking for subtitle support for your Plex Media? Several Plex plugins allow you to add subtitles to your videos.
Subtitles can help you (and other viewers) better understand your Plex media’s dialogue. They are also handy if some of your videos are in foreign languages or if you have viewers with hearing impairments.
Below are some of the top Plex plugins you can use to add subtitles to your media:
1. Sub-Zero
Sub-Zero is a Plex metadata plugin that automatically downloads subtitles for your media. It can search multiple sites to find the best subtitles for your videos, making it one of the best Plex subtitles plugins on the market.
In addition to automatic subtitle downloads, Sub-Zero allows for manual subtitle operation, offering a more accurate, customizable subtitle experience.
Some of the key features of the Sub-Zero plugin include:
- Subtitle matching – the plugin searches several subtitle providers like OpenSubtitles, SubScene, and Titlovi.com to find the best matching subtitles for your media.
- Automatic downloads—The plugin has a background task scheduler that periodically searches for (and downloads) missing or better subtitles for your media.
- Customizable storage – Sub-Zero lets you decide how downloaded subtitles will be stored in your Plex Media Server.
- Personalized preferences—The plugin allows you to configure several subtitle preferences, such as the languages to search for, hearing-impaired settings, embedded subtitles, foreign subtitles, and more.
- Manual modification – the plugin offers several features for manually modifying the downloaded subtitles.
2. Bazarr
Bazarr is another great Plex plugin for subtitles, designed as a companion application for Sonarr and Radarr. It automatically downloads the subtitles for the movies and TV shows in your Plex media server being tracked by the two applications (Sonarr and Radarr).
Bazarr offers the following features:
- Multiple subtitle providers support – the plugin supports several subtitle providers, including OpenSubtitles, Subs4Free, Titlovi, TVSubtitles, Addic7ed, and more.
- Automatic subtitle search – the plugin will automatically search for missing subtitles and download them when they become available in your desired language.
- Subtitles upgrade – the plugin periodically searches for subtitles for the media in your Plex library and upgrades them if a better match is found.
- Manual search – Bazarr allows you to manually search for subtitles for your Plex media and download them with the appropriate names to your library.
3. WebTools-NG
WebTools-NG is a Plex plugin that helps you manage your Plex Media Server better. It offers several features, including a download module you can use to download external subtitles for the media in your Plex library.
Besides subtitles download, WebTools-NG offers the following features:
- Media download – the plugin offers a download module for downloading media (into your Plex library) from any server that you have download rights to.
- ExportTools – the plugin has an export module that allows you to export .xlsx or .csv files containing a full list of your Plex library content. The exported files can include data like missing and misidentified files, which you can use to diagnose issues with your library.
- Plex Media Server module – the plugin offers a Plex Media Server module with several applications, such as Butler (for scheduling tasks) and Find Media (for scanning your library to locate missing media).
- Plex.TV module – the plugin offers a Plex.TV module that allows you to discover information about other users with whom you share your Plex Media Server.
4. Subliminal.bundle
Subliminal.bundle is another top Plex plugin for subtitles. The application searches several subtitle providers to find the best-matched subtitles for the media in your Plex library.
Subliminal.bundle offers several features for managing subtitles in Plex:
- Automatic subtitles search – the application automatically searches for and downloads subtitles for the files in your Plex library.
- Subtitle provider configuration – you can configure the plugin to download subtitles from your preferred provider(s). You can also set your preferred subtitle language(s) and minimum subtitle score (to ensure accuracy).
- Embedded and external subtitle support – the plugin supports the download of both embedded and external subtitles.
- Hearing-impaired subtitles – You can configure the plugin to download hearing-impaired subtitles.
- Customized subtitle storage – You can choose whether to store the downloaded subtitles next to the corresponding media files or as metadata in your Plex library.
5. Subgen
Subgen is another cool Plex plugin for managing subtitles on your Plex Media Server. The application automatically transcribes (using Whisper OpenAI) audio and video files in your Plex library to create subtitle files for them.
The Subgen Plex plugin offers the following features:
- Automatic subtitle generation using Whisper Open AI – the application supports automatic subtitle generation in several languages, including English, Arabic, Chinese, Spanish, and Dutch.
- Subtitle translation – it can translate the generated subtitles into English.
- Subtitle skipping – the plugin can skip auto-generating subtitles for media files with existing subtitles.
- Force language – allows the application to generate the right subtitles when the media language is wrongly detected.
- Bazarr support – the plugin can be integrated with Bazarr through the Whisper provider settings.
Alternative Plex subtitles options
In addition to the plugins above, there are other options for managing subtitles on your Plex Media Server. These include:
1. Radarr and Sonarr
Radarr and Sonarr are Plex plugins that automatically download and manage movies and TV shows in your Plex library.
The plugins are primarily designed for downloading movies and TV shows, not subtitles. However, they have an extra feature that allows them to import extra files, including subtitles, into your Plex library.
To activate this feature, go to the “Media Management” settings of both Radarr and Sonarr and check the “Import Extra Files” box.
Next, add a list of file extensions (like .srt and .sub) that the applications should import to your library alongside the downloads.
2. Plex’s automatic subtitles feature
Plex has an automatic subtitle feature that allows you to search for and display subtitles for the movies and TV shows in your Plex library during playback.
The feature works with OpenSubtitles.com.
To use it:
- Go to the pre-play screen of the movie or TV show in your Plex library.
- Use the subtitle selector (drop-down list next to “SUBTITLES”) to check whether your media has any subtitles.
- Click on “More” if there are no subtitles or you want to search for different ones from the already downloaded ones.
- Scroll through the results of the search window to find your desired subtitles. You can also change the language in the search window selector to another language (other than your account’s preferred subtitle language).
- Once you find the subtitle you want, click on it to download and use it during the playback.
NOTE: Once you click on a subtitle in the search window, it is temporarily downloaded to your Plex media server and will be available in all connected apps.
The subtitle you choose will remain as the default subtitle for the specific media file, unless you choose another subtitle, at which point it will be deleted from your Plex Media Server.
The downloaded subtitles are only visible to you (and not other users sharing your Plex media server).