by 
Watch the tutorial
Step 1: Open the Text panel and transcribe
You want to open the Text tab and make sure Transcript is selected. If you do not see it, go to Window > Text. With your audio or video selected, you should see a message saying the clip is untranscribed, with a Transcribe button. Click it and Premiere Pro writes out what is said.
Step 2: Turn on automatic transcription (optional)
To avoid doing this by hand every time, enable a hidden setting. On Windows go to Edit > Preferences > Transcription (on Mac it is under Premiere Pro > Settings). Tick Automatically transcribe clips. You can also adjust the other options, like the default language, and then click OK. From now on Premiere Pro transcribes your clips in the background.
Step 3: Fix mistakes in the transcript
Once it is finished, read through the text. Automatic transcription is good but not perfect, so check names and technical words. To change a line, double click it and type the correction, then click on the gray space to exit. If you want to remove commas, dots or other characters, use the Search field, type the character, open the Replace options, click Delete or Delete all.
Step 4: Create the captions
Click the CC icon at the top of the Text panel to open Create captions. Expand Captioning Preferences. Here you can set the Maximum length in characters, the Minimum duration in seconds, the gap between captions and whether you want Single or Double lines. Short captions with one line suit social media, while longer ones with two lines suit regular videos.
To save time later, click the three dots at the top and choose Save current settings as preset. Pick a name, click OK, and next time select your preset from the list. Then click Create captions.
Step 5: Style the captions
You now have captions on a new track. To change their look, double click the text in the Program Monitor, or open Window > Essential Graphics and go to the Edit tab. Here you can change the font, size, color, position and more. Once the first caption looks right, create a style: open the Track Style menu, choose Create Style..., name it and click OK.
To apply the look to every caption, click the upward pointing arrow next to Track Style (Push To Track or Style), select All captions on track and click OK. All your captions now share the same look. Next time you make captions, pick your custom style in the Style menu of the Create captions window.
Step 6: Keep your presets
Your caption preset and text style are stored in the Project panel, so you need to bring them into future projects for them to work there. To reuse them everywhere, export the style: click it, choose Export and save it to a location you like, such as your assets folder.
Tips
- Proofread before creating captions. It is much faster to fix text in the transcript than on each caption.
- Keep lines short. Fewer characters per caption are easier to read on a phone.
- Go further. Try animating your subtitles or a word by word style.
FAQ
How do I add automatic subtitles in Premiere Pro?
Open the Text panel, click Transcribe, then click the CC icon and choose Create captions.
Can Premiere Pro transcribe automatically?
Yes. In Preferences, open Transcription and tick Automatically transcribe clips.
How do I change the look of all captions at once?
Create a Track Style in Essential Graphics, then push it to all captions on the track.
Want finished text looks for your subtitles and titles? Take a look at the Ultimate Text Preset Pack.
