1.2.2 Captions (Prerecorded)

What does it mean?

Every pre-recorded video that has audio needs captions. Captions show the spoken words and other relevant sounds, such as music, laughter or a doorbell, in sync with the picture. They must be accurate and complete enough that someone who cannot hear gets the same information.

The exception is a video that is itself a media alternative for text on the page and is clearly labelled as such. Automatic captions that have not been checked often contain errors and do not count as reliable on their own.

Who does it help?

• Deaf and hard-of-hearing people
• People watching without sound, for example on public transport
• People who do not speak the language fluently
• People with auditory processing difficulties

Common failures

• Marketing or explainer videos without any captions
• Unchecked automatic captions with wrong names, numbers or missing sentences
• Captions burned into the image that are cut off, unreadable or out of sync
• Captions that contain speech but leave out sounds that matter for understanding

How we test it

• axe-core Automatic: axe-core finds typical violations. A violation is pre-filled as “fails”.
• evidence Evidence: our scanner collects material such as screenshots, lists and measurements.

Test question: Do videos with sound have correct, synchronised captions?

A person decides every criterion. No criterion ever passes automatically.

How to fix it

<video src="explainer.mp4" controls></video>

<video controls>
  <source src="explainer.mp4" type="video/mp4">
  <track kind="captions" src="explainer.en.vtt" srclang="en" label="English" default>
</video>

The WebVTT captions track lets the player show synchronised captions that viewers can turn on or off.

Practical tips

• If you embed videos from a platform, check that the captions are switched on and corrected there.
• Include speaker names when it is not obvious who is talking.

Guides and patterns on this

• Accessible video: captions, audio description and the playerA video only reaches people who can both see and hear it, unless you add captions, audio description and a player everyone can use. This is what WCAG asks for.

Official source

Understanding WCAG 2.2 at the W3C: 1.2.2 Captions (Prerecorded)