Loom has no way to take in a subtitle file you made yourself. Its help centre puts it in one sentence: "Users can’t upload external subtitle files to Loom." There is no import slot to hunt for and no hidden setting — the capability is documented as absent, so every minute spent looking for it is a minute wasted.
That one line has knock-on effects that people usually discover only after they have already produced a clean SRT: a translated caption track, a corrected transcript from another tool, or captions for a video whose language Loom guessed wrong. None of those files can go back in.
The limits, at a glance
| What you want to do | What Loom's documentation says | Page |
|---|---|---|
| Upload your own SRT or VTT | "Users can’t upload external subtitle files to Loom." | Manually regenerate transcripts |
| Choose the transcript language yourself | Detected automatically "based on the first 30 seconds of audio"; "Users can’t set a default language for all videos" | Manually regenerate transcripts |
| Caption a bilingual recording | "Loom detects one language per video." | Manually regenerate transcripts |
| Export captions | SRT download, restricted to certain plans and roles | Transcription and closed captions |
| Get captions inside the downloaded MP4 | Closed Captions "will not be included in the downloaded file" | Download your Loom video |
| Translate a transcript | "No, Loom currently does not support transcript translation." | Multi-language transcriptions |
Where Loom's captions actually come from
Captions on a Loom are a rendering of a transcript Loom generated itself, and the language of that transcript is decided by the recording, not by you. From the same page as the quote above:
"Loom automatically identifies the language of a video based on the first 30 seconds of audio. This detection informs the generation of AI features, including titles, transcripts, summaries, and captions."
Two more lines from that page sharpen it: "Users can’t set a default language for all videos; each video is processed based on the first 30 seconds of audio," and "Loom detects one language per video."
Read those three statements together and the design becomes clear. The first half-minute of audio decides the language for the whole video, and there is exactly one language per video. If your recording opens with thirty seconds of English housekeeping before you switch to Spanish, that opening is what the detection sees. And because you can't upload a replacement file, a wrong guess can't be corrected by handing Loom the right text.
What you can change is the transcript itself. Loom's captions page says: "Captions are based on your video’s transcript, so correcting the transcript will automatically correct the captions." The edit surface is narrow, though — the multi-language page says you will "only be able to edit individual words in your transcript, not the grammar," and that Loom currently doesn't "support corrections to words containing special characters or diacritics - ü, ß, ñ, á, ç, ô, è."
What you can take out of Loom
Transcripts themselves are broadly available: "Transcripts are available on all Loom plans (50+ distinct languages are supported)." Getting a caption file out is a different question, and it is gated by plan and role:
"You can download an SRT file of your captions. To download, select the " ... " above your video and then Download captions . Downloadable captions are only available to creators and admins on a Business/Business + AI plan, and members and admins on an Enterprise plan ."
Two things to take from that. First, SRT is the format that page names — if you need VTT or anything else, check the official documentation rather than assuming. Second, free-plan users can read a transcript on the share page but are not in the list of roles that can download the caption file.
Now pair that with what happens on download. Loom's download page is explicit about what does not survive:
"While all video trims will be retained in the mp4-downloaded format, it's important to note that other Loom features, including CTAs, Filler Word + Silence removal, Chapters, and Closed Captions, will not be included in the downloaded file."
So the video and the captions leave Loom as two separate files — an MP4 with no caption track, and (if your role allows it) an SRT sitting next to it. And since external subtitle files can't go back in, there is no supported way to reunite them inside Loom.
What to do when you hit this
If the captions need to travel with the video — to a client, a learning platform, a social upload, anywhere outside the Loom player — the remaining route is to burn them into the picture. Download the MP4, download the SRT, and render the text into the frames so it is part of the video rather than a sidecar file that Loom refuses to accept.
Try it right here
Runs in your browser. Your file is not uploaded anywhere.
This runs in your browser tab: the MP4 and the SRT are read from disk, combined locally, and handed back to you. Nothing is uploaded, which matters for internal recordings that were never meant to leave the company. If the caption file you have is in a different format from what your workflow expects, SRT to VTT and VTT to SRT convert between the two the same way.
One caveat if your plan is to burn the captions in and push the result back into Loom as a new video: uploading is itself restricted. Loom's upload page states that "Video uploading is only available to users on Loom's Loom's Business, Business + AI or Enterprise plans" (the repetition is in the original), and that "Loom limits uploads to 4 GB or 12 hours, whichever is less."
Gotchas worth knowing before you plan around this
- Your admin can switch off downloads entirely. Loom's page on disabling downloads says that once disabled, "users in your workspace will no longer have the ability to download videos and transcripts." That capability is described as available "on Enterprise and Premium (Business+AI) plans" and "for Atlassian-managed workspaces only." Note it takes the transcript with it, not just the video.
- There is no API to script around it. Loom's own answer: "Loom does not offer a open API at this time" (again, the typo is in the original). It adds that the Loom SDK "is not an open API and does not provide the same functionalities as APIs."
- Viewer translation is not transcript translation. The captions page says "Viewers can translate captions into the language of their choice," but adds that translations "are auto-generated by AI based on the video’s transcript" and will be unavailable "if the creator’s workspace doesn’t allow AI." The transcript itself still can't be translated.
- An unsupported spoken language produces nothing to caption. Loom's AI-eligibility page says to "Verify the spoken language is supported by Loom," and that "Unsupported languages (for example, Hebrew) will fail to produce transcripts, disabling all AI functionality."
FAQ
Can I upload an SRT file to Loom? No. Loom's documentation states directly: "Users can’t upload external subtitle files to Loom." There is no import path for a caption file you produced elsewhere.
How do I fix captions in the wrong language? You can't supply a corrected file, so the lever you have is the transcript editor — captions follow the transcript. Loom detects the language "based on the first 30 seconds of audio" and detects "one language per video," so a recording that opens in a different language than it continues in is the common cause.
Can I download captions from Loom? Yes, as an SRT, but only in certain roles: "creators and admins on a Business/Business + AI plan, and members and admins on an Enterprise plan."
Will the downloaded MP4 have subtitles baked in? No. Loom lists Closed Captions among the features that "will not be included in the downloaded file." Burn them in yourself if you need them to travel with the video.
My video has no transcript at all — now what? Loom's captions page attributes this to "the video length, a delayed processing time or the video was recorded before the transcript feature launched," and recommends "downloading the video and re-uploading it." Remember that uploading needs a Business, Business + AI or Enterprise plan.
Captions that a platform refuses to accept as a file can still be made permanent by rendering them into the frames — see burn subtitles into video, more platform limits in our limits guides, or the full set of browser-based Clapr tools.
Quotes are from Loom's help centre pages on transcripts and captions, downloads, uploads and plans, checked 16 September 2026. Loom's pages have changed before — verify against the official documentation before relying on them.
