Netflix has rolled out a new feature and it might be great of you like to keep it simple when it comes to turning on those subtitles. As part of this new feature subscribers can now choose original language subtitles that will show only the spoken dialogue.
Until now whenever one turned on the subtitles in the original language they would turn on subtitles for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing (SDH/CC), which includes dialogues alongwith audio cues like “phone buzzing” or “dramatic music swells”, as well as speaker names. But with this new subtitle option you can just see the dialogues spoken and nothing else.
This new feature will first appear on new titles coming to Netflix, debuting with the newly launched ‘You’ season 5. Now when you open the language and subtitles option on your device you can see two subtitle options: one, English, that includes only the spoken dialogues and two, English (CC), with both dialogues and audio cues.
Moreover, from now on this option won’t be limited to just English language but will be available for all new Netflix originals in every language offered by Netflix in addition to SDH/CC. Also, there will be options to customize the subtitles by changing the font and size.
According to Netflix, these changes have been made based on the fact that 50% Americans like to watch content with subtitles on. In actual this isn’t just a US phenomenon and public around the world prefers to keep the subtitles on.
There are two major reasons cited by viewers for this: firstly it helps in better comprehension of things overall and secondly, enhances understanding of various accents.
In a country as linguistically diverse as India how this feature turns out will be interesting to see. One other thing to note here is that as of now Netflix talks about this new subtitle option being available only for their original content and there’s nothing about whether this option will extend to licensed content or not. And while this might not hold much significance elsewhere it does matter to the Indian audience. Hopefully Netflix will see to it soon.