Deaf News: Instagram launches automatic captions for Stories

The social media app Instagram has today rolled out a captions sticker on its platform, making it easier for users to make video content posted on Stories accessible for deaf and hard of hearing people.

The news comes after several Deaf content creators spotted the option in March, but a Facebook company spokesperson said at the time that the feature was “not publicly testing at the moment”.

However, Instagram have since announced that the feature is now available in English-speaking countries, with plans to extend it to other countries and languages “soon”.

A spokesperson told The Limping Chicken: “We know that ‘sound off’ is a popular option for watching content on Instagram – you may not always be somewhere where you want your sound on, yet you still want to see (and ‘hear’) content you’re interested in.”

The launch of the new captions sticker for Stories comes after Instagram introduced captions to their Threads and IGTV features last year, and the platform has also confirmed that they will soon test the feature in its TikTok rival, Reels.

“We’re excited to now be doing just that, to help make these features more efficient, inclusive and easier for everyone to watch and understand,” the spokesperson added.

Users can add captions to a Stories post by recording a video or selecting one from their photo gallery, opening the sticker tray and selecting ‘captions’ from the options available.

The user’s speech will then be converted to text, with the option for the transcription to be edited in terms of style, text, colour and position.

Photo: Instagram.

By Liam O’Dell. Liam is a mildly deaf freelance journalist and campaigner from Bedfordshire. He wears bilateral hearing aids and can be found talking about disability, theatre, politics and more on Twitter and on his website.