How to import SRT subtitles into Final Cut Pro

Final Cut Pro imports SRT subtitles natively: open your project, choose File > Import > Closed Captions (called Import Captions in some versions), select the .srt, pick a language role, and the subtitles land in a caption lane at the top of the timeline. Every Final Cut Pro release since 10.4.4 (2018) supports it. That's the whole answer for delivery captions — but it's only half the story, because FCP treats imported SRT as closed captions, which look and behave nothing like styled, on-screen subtitles. When you want subtitles you can design — fonts, sizes, colors, positions, per-line — the route is converting the SRT to FCPXML titles instead.

This guide covers both routes, the insertion-time setting that silently puts subtitles an hour off, and how to decide which route your project actually needs.

Route 1: import the SRT as closed captions

The native path, per Apple's own steps:

1. Open the project in the timeline (captions import into a project, not into the browser).
2. Choose File > Import > Closed Captions and select the .srt file. (FCP also accepts .itt and .scc here.)
3. In Import as Role, choose a caption role and a language subrole — this is how FCP organizes multiple caption languages on one timeline.
4. In Insertion Time, choose Relative to Timeline or Absolute — see the next section before you click.
5. Click Import. The captions appear as connected clips in a caption lane above the video.

From there, captions ride along with the edit, can be toggled per-language, and export either embedded or as a sidecar file when you share.

The insertion-time gotcha (subtitles an hour off)

That Insertion Time choice is where imports go quietly wrong:

• Relative to Timeline adds your project's start time to every caption's timestamp. A zero-based SRT (first cue at 00:00:05) on a timeline that starts at 01:00:00:00 lands the first caption at 01:00:05 — correct, on-screen five seconds after program start.
• Absolute places captions at exactly the timecode written in the SRT, ignoring the project start. Use it when the SRT itself carries hour-based timecode (for example, one exported from a broadcast timeline).

The symptom of choosing wrong is always the same: every caption is offset by exactly the project's start time — usually one hour. If your subtitles vanished, check the start of the caption lane, not the SRT.

What you can (and can't) style on SRT captions

Select a caption and the Closed Caption inspector offers bold, italic, underline, text color, and a placement field. But Apple's documentation is blunt about the catch: the SRT standard has no real text-formatting specification, so styling you apply in FCP "may not appear correctly in your intended player" — and FCP offers to strip all formatting on export for exactly that reason.

In practice: SRT captions are for delivery — a clean, compliant subtitle track the player renders in its own style. They are not a design surface. If the styling matters, you've outgrown captions.

Route 2: convert the SRT to FCPXML titles

Titles are FCP's fully styleable text: any font, size, color, position, shadow, or animation, adjustable per clip in the Inspector, and burned into the picture on export. There's no built-in way to turn an SRT into titles — this is the workflow the SRT to FCPXML converter exists for:

1. Open the SRT to FCPXML converter.
2. Drop the .srt and choose your timeline's frame rate — each cue is frame-aligned at that rate.
3. Download the .fcpxml and in Final Cut Pro choose File > Import > XML.
4. The import contains one editable Basic Title per subtitle cue, timed to match. Drag them over your footage, or lift the whole set into your project.

Because every cue is an ordinary Basic Title, styling works the way titles always do: select one (or all of them), set the look in the Inspector, done. This is also the standard answer when a client wants "open" subtitles — text permanently visible in the picture — rather than a caption track viewers can switch off.

The same trick works in reverse: if someone hands you a Final Cut project where the subtitles were built as titles, the FCPXML to SRT converter extracts them — with exact timeline timing — back into a standard subtitle file.

Captions or titles — a 10-second decision

• Deliverable needs a caption track (YouTube, broadcast spec, streaming platform, accessibility requirement) → Route 1, native caption import. Compliance and toggleability are the point.
• Subtitles are part of the picture (styled documentary subs, translations burned into a social cut, festival deliverables with designed subs) → Route 2, FCPXML titles. Design control is the point.
• Both — a styled burn-in and a caption file? Do both: import the captions for the sidecar export, convert to titles for the look. They coexist happily in one project.

Getting subtitles back out of Final Cut Pro

For the round trip: caption lanes export from File > Export > Captions (or as a sidecar in the share sheet), and title-based subtitles come out via File > Export XML plus the FCPXML to SRT converter. Working in DaVinci Resolve instead? The same decision tree exists there — covered in the guide on adding SRT subtitles in DaVinci Resolve.

FAQ

Does Final Cut Pro support SRT files directly? Yes — File > Import > Closed Captions accepts .srt (plus .itt and .scc) in every version since Final Cut Pro 10.4.4, released in 2018. The subtitles import as closed captions in a caption lane, organized under a language role.

Why are my imported subtitles an hour off? The Insertion Time setting. "Relative to Timeline" adds the project's start time (often 01:00:00:00) to each cue; "Absolute" uses the SRT's timecode as-is. A zero-based SRT wants Relative; an hour-based SRT wants Absolute. Re-import with the other setting.

How do I convert SRT to Final Cut Pro titles? Convert the SRT to FCPXML with the SRT to FCPXML converter — one editable Basic Title per cue, frame-aligned at your timeline rate — then File > Import > XML in Final Cut Pro and drag the titles over your footage.

Can I style SRT captions inside Final Cut Pro? Only lightly — bold, italic, underline, a text color, and placement — and Apple's own documentation warns that SRT has no formatting spec, so players may ignore what you apply. For designed subtitles, convert to titles instead; those style like any other text in FCP.

Should I import my SRT as captions or convert it to titles? Captions when the deliverable needs a subtitle track (platform specs, accessibility, toggleable languages). Titles when subtitles are a visual element you want styled and burned in. Projects that need both can do both at once.

Can I get an SRT back out of a Final Cut Pro project? Yes. Caption lanes export via File > Export > Captions. Subtitles built as titles have no native subtitle export — export the timeline as FCPXML and run it through the FCPXML to SRT converter, which resolves each title's real timeline position.

Is this free? Free to start. Guests convert up to 3 files per batch at up to 1 MB each; a free account raises that to 5 files and 30 conversions a month, and paid plans support 20 MB files and larger batches.