Popular police comedy Brooklyn Nine-Nine, controversial animated series South Park and sitcom It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia have been listed as three entertainment shows where its subtitles are the hardest to understand.
Subtitles from the most recent seasons of the above three shows – analysed by the online word generator WordFinderX – found speeds of 174.6, 160 and 176.2 words-per-minute (wpm) respectively.
While WordFinderX cites a suggested 170wpm limit on subtitle speed from the Dublin-based National Disability Authority, the BBC gives a recommended range of between 160 to 180wpm.
The UK’s broadcasting regulator, Ofcom, also states in its guidance that programmes should not exceed 180wpm.
Many academic studies, meanwhile, refer to the “six-second rule”, which one paper says translates to a much lower threshold of around 140 to 150wpm.
TV programmes on the smaller end of the scale include zombie drama The Walking Dead with 54.3wpm, gritty BBC hit Peaky Blinders at 72.8wpm, and HBO fantasy franchise Game of Thrones at 73.9wpm.
The findings follow a survey from the polling company YouGov last week, which revealed more than 60% of 18 to 25-year-olds now watch TV shows and movies with the subtitles turned on.
By Liam O’Dell. Liam is an award-winning Deaf freelance journalist and campaigner from Bedfordshire. He can be found talking about disability, theatre, politics and more on Twitter and on his website.
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Hartmut
March 3, 2023
In 2013 when I was in Germany, the subtitles run much slower. Dunno what speed. In addition they are in better quality with colors to indicate the speakers. The lines are not always placed at the bottom.. Lines are not displayed in caps what make them more readable. Lines in all caps are usually a NONO, according to typographic principles of readability. I haven’t been able to see Live shows to see live subtitling. I think, they are given in replays. My hearing relatives reported that the subtitled texts were not all verbatim. Some editing was done to meet the lower reading ability of an average Deafie. For example,
words from foreign languages were “germanized”.