All the way back in February, Zoom said it planned to roll out automatic closed captioning, or live transcription, to free accounts. Now it’s making good on that promise. Thanks, Zoom.
The feature was previously only available on paid accounts but that drew a bit of criticism because why should people that need it pay extra for accessibility features. At the moment only English captions are available, so it’s not quite achieved real accessibility. But the company said it is working on adding more languages in the future, so hopefully, they aren’t too far off.
“It’s important to us that everyone can successfully connect, communicate, and participate using Zoom,” says Theresa Larkin, the company’s product marketing manager of meetings and chat.
Zoom zooms to the top of the accessible queue
The added accessibility features don’t stop there. The company has also added support for multiple videos to be shown at the same time, aimed at allowing sign language interpreters to be visible when someone is talking, otherwise what’s the point.
If you want to (or need to) enable the feature, you’ll have to be the account owner or have admin privileges. Log in to the web portal and head to account management. Then go account settings > meeting tab > in meeting (advanced). There you’ll find the toggle for closed captioning.
Source: The Verge