Overview
Transcripts are text versions of the content in an audio or video presentation. They are provided as an alternative to watching the video or listening to the audio.
For an audio presentation (e.g., a podcast), this is the only means of providing access to the content for people who are unable to hear it.
In contrast, video presentations should be captioned, as it’s important for the text to be synchronized with the video. Transcripts are not required if the video is captioned. However, it’s a best practice to provide them anyway, as the transcripts provide additional benefits (see the section on Benefits of Transcripts below).
Techniques
Transcripts can be obtained through any of the methods described on the Captions page. It’s essentially the same service, but the typical deliverable is just text, without timestamps.
Most captioning services accept either audio or video files for transcription.
Benefits of Transcripts
- Transcripts provide the only means of accessing content from an audio presentation if a person is unable to hear the audio.
- Transcripts are accessible to people who are deaf-blind (e.g., accessing the web using a Braille device), whereas captions generally are not.
- Transcripts benefit people with slow Internet connections or other technical issues that prevent media from playing
- Transcripts can be searched or scanned quickly, providing a more efficient means for busy people to access a recording’s content.
Since a transcript is an alternative to the video, it should include both audio content and descriptions of important visual information.
Able Player (the free, open-source media player designed and coded with accessibility in mind) has the ability to generate an interactive transcript automatically using the video’s caption and description tracks.
WCAG 2.1 success criteria
The issues described on this page, and associated Techniques pages, map to the following success criteria in the W3C’s Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1: