How to Turn On Live Captions in Zoom
Zoom can display live captions during calls — showing what each person says as on-screen text.
3 min read · 5 steps · Checked April 2026
Step 1. Enable Captions in Your Zoom Account (Hosts)
If you host meetings, go to zoom.us in a browser and sign in. Click "Settings" in the left menu. Under the "Meeting" tab, find "Captions" or "Automated captions" and make sure it is toggled on. Save the changes. Now captions will be available in your meetings.
Step 2. Turn On Captions During a Meeting
Join or start a Zoom meeting. Look at the toolbar at the bottom of the Zoom window. Find the "CC" button (Closed Captions) or "Live Transcript" button. Click it and choose "Show Subtitles" or "Enable Auto-Transcription." Captions appear at the bottom of your screen right away.
Quick Tip
Quick Tip: If you do not see the CC button, click the "More" button (…) in the toolbar. It may be hidden there. Or ask the meeting host to enable captions.
Step 3. Adjust Caption Size
Once captions are showing, look for a small settings icon near the captions at the bottom of the screen. Click it to change the caption font size — Small, Medium, or Large. Choose Large if you find the default text hard to read.
Step 4. View the Full Transcript
Click the "CC" or "Live Transcript" button and choose "View Full Transcript." A panel opens on the right side of the screen showing the complete running transcript of the meeting. You can scroll back to read earlier parts of the conversation.
Step 5. Save the Transcript After the Meeting
At the end of the meeting, the host can save the transcript. Participants can also save what is visible in the transcript panel — click the "Save Transcript" button if it appears, or copy and paste the text into a document. Zoom may also email the transcript after the meeting if the host has that option enabled.
Quick Tip
Quick Tip: If you are hard of hearing and regularly attend Zoom calls, ask the host ahead of time to enable captions so they are ready when the meeting starts.
Zoom has a built-in live captions feature that displays spoken words as text at the bottom of the screen during a meeting. Each participant's words appear in real time, making it much easier to follow along — especially in a noisy environment, if you have hearing loss, or if someone has a strong accent.
Live captions (also called automated captions) are available on the free Zoom plan. The meeting host must have the captions feature enabled in their Zoom account settings, and individual participants can then turn captions on or off for themselves.
If you are joining a meeting and want captions, you look for the "CC" button in the meeting toolbar. If you are hosting, you may need to first enable the feature in your Zoom account settings online before it shows up during meetings.
Zoom also offers a full transcript feature — a running text transcript of the whole meeting that you can read and download after the call ends. This is especially useful for longer meetings or for reviewing what was said.
Captions are generated automatically by Zoom's speech-to-text engine. Accuracy is generally very good in quiet environments with clear speakers, though it can struggle with heavy background noise or multiple people talking at once.
Official sources
- Apple Accessibility — apple.com
- Google Accessibility — google.com
- Microsoft Accessibility — microsoft.com
- AARP Tech & Accessibility — aarp.org
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