# Captionista: Video Subtitles — Captions & Text Editor

> Video subtitle and caption editor with advanced timing and style controls. (iPhone/iPad app by Montana Floss Co..)

- Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/captionista-video-subtitles/id1523464363 (this page in markdown: same URL + `.md`)
- Developer: [Montana Floss Co.](https://appshunter.io/developer/889019887)
- Category: Photo & Video, Social Networking
- Price: Free with in-app purchases
- Rating: 4.10/5 from 12 App Store ratings · 7 written reviews indexed
- Age rating: 4+
- Requires: iOS 15.0 · 24 MB
- Languages: British English
- Released: 2022-08-27
- Data updated: 2026-08-27
- Monetization: freemium
- User reviews in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/captionista-video-subtitles/id1523464363/reviews.md

## What is Captionista?

Captionista is a free app for adding accurate subtitles and captions to videos. With full control of pacing and subtitle length you make a greater impact and readability is improved.

Many themes and color schemes are included for free, with a Pro subscription option to unlock full control.

“A big win for accessibility on your videos” — TechRadar

“This wonderfully conceived app removes the faff from subtitling.” — Stuff.tv

HOW IT WORKS

1. You type in all the text while watching to the video. Change speed if you need to slow it down.

2. Choose a style.

3. Tap to split text at the right time in the video.

4. Export the video on your device in minutes.

There’s no need for artificial intelligence when you have real intelligence!

FEATURES

• Script editor with video player, slow mode and skip controls for quickly typing the text to add to the video all at once.
• Unique timing editor — tap on a word to split the text at the current video time.
• Freestyle mode allows the moving, rotation and resizing of each individual subtitle for more visual interest.
• Free-form editing: Text edits automatically update subtitles in the timing editor. Adjust timing, merge and re-split subtitles easily without affecting later subtitles.
• Choose one of many themes and color schemes selected for high contrast and readability.
• Save custom themes synced with iCloud and share theme files with others (requires Pro).
• Pre-flight Check warns about video size, quality and length issues for common social networks.
• Automatic subtitle insets avoid the user interface of apps like TikTok and Instagram Reels.
• Looping video player makes it easy to keep reviewing progress.
• Smart Zoom to focus in on just the subtitles in the video.
• Warnings about reading speeds and subtitles that will not show in full.
• SRT import for adding subtitles that are already transcribed.

ADVANCED STYLE EDITOR

• Intelligent style controls that work together to give great results every time.
• Adjust the text area size and position, maximum lines, line length and alignment.
• Custom text size, fonts, shadows, colors and outlines (requires Pro).
• Custom subtitle background styles, colors and padding (requires Pro).

EXPORT OPTIONS

• Exclude audio if not required.
• Automatically scale low quality videos up to 1080p for high quality subtitle text.
• Option to scale down high resolution videos down to 1080p for faster uploads.
• Export directly to Photos or to other apps using the share sheet.
• SRT export for accessible closed caption support (requires Pro).

For Terms of Use see: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

## Key features

- Script editor with video player
- Unique timing editor
- Freestyle mode for subtitle placement
- Free-form text editing
- Multiple themes and color schemes
- Pre-flight Check for social networks
- SRT import and export

## Pricing and in-app purchases

Base price: Free.

**Subscriptions**

| Subscription | Price | Period |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Pro Monthly | $4.49 | per month |
| Pro Yearly | $21.99 | per year |


## Recent user reviews (7 of 7)

All indexed reviews: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/captionista-video-subtitles/id1523464363/reviews.md

### 5/5 — Great new features

*2023-07-04*

Really like the flexibility and new features the App offers.

### 2/5 — Needs work

*2023-06-09*

Just subscribed only to find out that it’s a daunting task to add subtitles. It has a great simple format that should work. But it doesn’t allow quick video creation. Unfortunately there is no auto correction for time limits which delay the creative process tremendously. Till the point where you’d probably just set it to the side and forget this app even exists on your device. I’d add an update to correct this defeating problem. One that auto corrects the time reading length of the text for the videos and allows for a more instant experience.

Only right to pay for something that works for you and not the other way around. I’ll change my rating when ever this is addressed and consider cancelling my subscription if not.

**Developer response:** Hi, I’m the developer of the app. Thank you for subscribing and taking the time to leave a rating and review! I’m not 100% clear what your issues are here. Can you please use the (?) button in the app and tap “Get Help” — where you will find instructions and a link to contact me directly so I can help you?

I’ll try to help here however. I’m not sure what you mean by video creation — if you want to edit the video itself, no we don’t support that currently but we may in future. We’d love to hear more about what you need! The reading time warnings are just warnings. If you are matching subtitles to speech in the video, you don’t need to worry if the person was just talking fast. You can adjust the start and end times of subtitles by tapping the start and end time buttons of each subtitle at the time you want. If you’re not matching speech in a video and just want all the text to be readable in the time you have in the video, that’s an interesting feature we could add!

Again, thanks so much for leaving a review and please do contact us directly using the app's "Get Help" or "Send us e-mail" options. We love to help people!

### 5/5 — Perfect for adding captions

*2022-09-29*

This has been a handy tool that saves me a bunch of time. Free version is everything I need and is simple enough.
The hardest thing other tools don’t do well (particularly the AI ones) is cadence. The first two attempts, I had some growing pains, but then I checked out the help section which cleared up my issues. It was easier than I had presumed and now can get the timing perfect. Would have loved to see a sample on first open to show core workflow.

**Developer response:** Thanks for persevering and we’re glad you like it! You’re 100% correct that cadence is usually hard to do and we designed the UI for this to make it as easy as possible to try different cadences by re-timing the start and end or merging and re-splitting at a different point. We’ll definitely try to improve the onboarding some more.

### 5/5 — The best app for TikTok captions!

*2022-09-23*

This is the only app I’ll trust for my reels and TikTok content. I prefer manual captions since AI tends to cause more work than it’s worth. Assembling captions is easy and there’s a TON of customization options. Plus, this app is Apple-centric and supports all the features you’d expect like iCloud and HDR.

**Developer response:** Great to hear you love the app Marius. We’ll keep working hard to bring you new features for making your TikToks and Reels even better.

### 5/5 — Super useful

*2022-09-19*

I had only ever captioned videos through Instagram before, but if I’m not sharing a video there, this fits the job nicely. Well done.

**Developer response:** Cheers Tim!

### 4/5 — Yup, it’s good.

*2022-09-06*

This app popped up on my radar because of it’s simplicity. The captions are super easy to make and time, the exporting was quick and high quality, and the free version is perfect for my needs. The only things that are missing for me are keyboard shortcuts. The ability to undo with CMD + Z or pause with SPACE would make working in this app even more intuitive. But overall, it’s definitely going on my iOS editing toolbelt!

**Developer response:** Thanks for the great feedback! We are of course going to add keyboard shortcuts soon — it just didn’t make the 1.0 release!

### 1/5 — No

*2022-09-01*

very normal app nothing special but subscription is too high

**Developer response:** We’re sorry you feel the app is nothing special. You do know the app is very usable completely free? Perhaps you can email us (details in app) and tell us what would make it special? As for subscriptions, we are a tiny company — we are running a sustainable business that allows us to continue making this app better for everyone, and have more people subtitling videos for the benefit of everyone. Subscriptions enable this.

## Frequently asked questions about Captionista

### How do I add subtitles with Captionista?

Captionista allows you to type text while watching your video. You can adjust the playback speed and tap to split text at the precise moment it should appear. The app also supports SRT import for pre-transcribed subtitles.

### Can I customize the look of my subtitles in Captionista?

Yes, Captionista offers many free themes and color schemes for high contrast and readability. The Pro subscription unlocks advanced style controls, including custom fonts, colors, shadows, and subtitle backgrounds.

### What are the export options for videos created with Captionista?

You can export your video directly to your Photos app or other applications. Options include excluding audio, scaling videos to 1080p for quality or faster uploads, and SRT export for closed caption support with a Pro subscription.

### Does Captionista have ads?

No, Captionista does not contain advertisements. The app is free to use with an optional Pro subscription for advanced features.

### What devices does Captionista support?

Captionista is available on iPhone, iPad, and iPod. It is designed to work seamlessly across these Apple devices.

### How often is Captionista updated?

The app was last updated on October 13, 2024, indicating regular maintenance and potential feature additions. The latest version is 1.5.3.

### What is the Pro subscription for Captionista?

The Pro subscription unlocks advanced features like custom text styles, custom subtitle backgrounds, iCloud theme syncing, and SRT export. It is available as a monthly plan for $4.49 or a yearly plan for $21.99.

### What is the age rating for Captionista?

Captionista has an age rating of 4+, making it suitable for a wide range of users, including younger audiences interested in video creation.

## Version history (last 5 releases)

### 1.5.3 — 2024-10-13

Fixed a bug where subtitles might not be included in exported videos if there is no subtitle at the end time of the video.

### 1.5.2 — 2023-08-08

A single bug fix:

* Fixed a bug where user-installed fonts were not available for Pro users in project Style settings.

### 1.5.1 — 2023-07-11

Some improvements and bug fixes:

* Improved iPad Hover support, highlighting the word as well as the split point.
* Improvements to the rendering of overflowing subtitle cards in timeline view.
* Added hover to the subtitle issue and Freestyle buttons.
* Fixed a bug where tapping the per-subtitle issues button would not auto-expand the issue details panel.
* Fixed a bug where tapping the "set end time" button on subtitle cards would not work.
* Fixed a bug where directly sharing a video from another app like LumaFusion or Final Cut Pro to Captionista would not import the video.

### 1.5 — 2023-06-22

A big update!

FREESTYLE — move, rotate and resize each individual subtitle for more visual interest.

SRT CLOSED CAPTIONS — import or export SRT subtitle files.

COLOR TRENDS — a selection of new color schemes that we’ll update over the seasons.

HOVER SUPPORT — for iPad users with pointing device or Apple Pencil.

FULL SCREEN ZOOM — see your subtitle previews full screen to check the finer details.

Here’s everything else…

- Improvements to the experience when starting a new document in Script mode, with import & paste options
- Improved interactions with subtitle cards — tapping anywhere in overflowing text now splits on the first overflowing word
- Import or export subtitles as a text file
- New full screen background style
- New subtitle issue warning if Freestyle text is going to be clipped
- Landscape orientation support for full screen preview of landscape aspect videos
- Share the current document from the Export screen
- Much improved UI responsiveness throughout, especially when editing styles.
- Lots of performance and battery improvements
- Bug fix: Some missing localization strings for U.S. English
- Bug fix: A crash that could happen if splitting a subtitle just at the end of its duration
- Bug fix: Export popover only showing once on iPad
- Bug fix: Subtitle issue warnings not always auto-selecting the active subtitle
- Bug fix: Subtitle area brackets in Style > Layout now correct when max lines is one

### 1.1.4 — 2023-05-13

* Multiple issues with syncing Saved Themes are now resolved
* Video looping should be smooth for non-HDR videos now, with no short gap
* Fixed a bug where the warning popover about the Text Area going outside the Smart Insets would display as a narrow and very tall popover.
* Improvement to subtitle splitting — a tap anywhere in the "overflow" text will split on the first overflowing word
* Improvement to subtitle end time setting — if there is overflowing text and you tap the set end time button on the active subtitle, it will automatically split at the first overflowing word as well as setting the end time
* Fixed a bug where tapping the first word of a subtitle while the video is playing would not set the start time of the subtitle.
* Portrait videos are given a little more height in the the UI to make it easier to read subtitles when not zoomed
* Fixed a bug where renaming a Saved Theme only worked once.
* Improved Pre-flight Check to only show errors if there are both errors and warnings for a specific social network and post type.
* Translations for U.S. English.

## Apps similar to Captionista

| App | Rating | Price | Category |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| [Text On Video: Easy Vid Editor](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/text-on-video-easy-vid-editor/id880790176) | 3.9 (2,223) | Free | Photo & Video |
| [Over.Video: Add Text to Videos](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/overvideo-add-text-to-videos/id810713114) | 3.9 (464) | Free | Photo & Video |
| [Captions AI: Video Subtitles](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/captions-ai-video-subtitles/id6468552543) | 4.4 (233) | Free | Photo & Video |
| [Hype-Type: Moving Text Photo-s](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/hype-type-moving-text-photo-s/id1152687277) | 4.5 (28,766) | Free | Photo & Video |
| [CapCut: Photo & Video Editor](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/capcut-photo-and-video-editor/id1500855883) | 4.6 (1,118,649) | Free | Photo & Video |
| [Picsart AI Photo Editor, Video](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/picsart-ai-photo-editor-video/id587366035) | 4.7 (1,194,214) | Free | Photo & Video |

## More apps by Montana Floss Co.

- [Hobson — Insult Generator](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/hobson-insult-generator/id991184506)
- [Frame Screenshots: Shareshot](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/frame-screenshots-shareshot/id6474271573)

All apps by Montana Floss Co.: https://appshunter.io/developer/889019887

## Related topics

[subtitles editor](https://appshunter.io/ios/topics/subtitles-editor)

---

*Data collected daily from the US App Store and indexed by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/). User reviews are verbatim App Store reviews. Ratings, prices and chart positions refresh continuously; this snapshot is from 2026-08-27.*
