Video caption questions

How do I make word-by-word captions on iPhone?

Use a captions app that times every word, and turn on word highlighting. Captionry makes captions on your iPhone with a time for every word. Tap Templates and set Karaoke Highlight to Word: each word lights up as it is spoken, in the preview and in the exported video. Like the 20 caption styles, word-by-word highlighting is free.

What to know

  • Four modes: Highlight colours only the word being spoken, Fill colours every word spoken so far, Fade shows words dim until they are spoken, and Pop makes the spoken word slightly bigger.
  • Highlight and Fill come in four colours: gold, pink, cyan and green.
  • Word moves the highlight one whole word at a time. Character moves it one character at a time.
  • The highlight works with any template and moves along the first caption line. A second line in another language stays still.

Checked: October 2026

How to do it with Captionry

  1. Open Captionry, pick your video, set Speech to the language spoken and tap Start (the first time, choose Keep on this iPhone or Use AI first).
  2. When the captions are ready, tap Templates. Under Karaoke Highlight, choose Word or Character.
  3. Pick a mode, and a colour for Highlight or Fill. Play the video to check it.
  4. Tap Export. The highlight is burned into the saved video.

Related questions

Can I show one word at a time?

Not as a setting. Captions are short phrases, and a new one starts at each pause or when the line is full; the highlight then moves through it word by word.

Does the highlight still work after I fix a word?

Yes. If the words no longer match what was heard, the highlight is spread evenly across that caption’s time.

Is the Karaoke template the same thing?

No. Karaoke is one of the 20 templates, a look with a coloured band behind the text. Word highlighting is set separately, under Karaoke Highlight, and works with any template.

Caption your video in Captionry

Captions are made on your iPhone. Making captions, editing and exporting without a watermark are free; optional AI polish includes 15 free video minutes a month. iPhone only.

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