The Intrusive Black Box
Google Chrome features an accessibility tool called “Live Caption.” Using on-device machine learning, Live Caption automatically listens to any audio playing in your browser—whether it’s a YouTube video, a podcast, or even a Zoom web meeting—and generates real-time text subtitles in a floating black box at the bottom of your screen. While this is an incredible, vital tool for users who are deaf or hard of hearing, it can be extremely distracting for others. If you accidentally hit the global media control shortcut, or if a Chrome update silently enabled the feature, you might find this black box constantly popping up and obscuring the bottom quarter of the videos you are trying to watch.
How to Disable Live Caption in Chrome Settings
Because Live Caption is processed locally on your computer (it doesn’t send audio to the cloud), it is tied entirely to your local browser settings, not your Google Account.
1. Open the Google Chrome browser.
2. Click the three vertical dots (More menu) in the top-right corner of the window.
3. Select Settings.
4. In the left-hand navigation sidebar, scroll down and click on Accessibility.
5. At the very top of the Accessibility pane, you will see a toggle switch labelled Live Caption. (The sub-text explains that it “Automatically creates captions for English audio and video”).
6. Click the toggle switch to turn it Off.
The floating black subtitle box will instantly disappear from any currently playing videos, and Chrome will stop analyzing audio streams in the background to generate text.
How to Disable Live Caption via Media Controls
If you don’t want to dig through the settings menu, there is a faster way to toggle the feature on and off directly from the browser toolbar.
1. Ensure that audio or video is currently playing in at least one Chrome tab.
2. Look at the top-right corner of the Chrome window, just to the left of your profile picture and the Extensions puzzle piece. You will see an icon that looks like three horizontal lines with a musical note (the Media Control button).
3. Click the Media Control icon.
4. A drop-down menu will appear showing what is currently playing. At the bottom of this menu, look for a small rectangular icon with “CC” inside it (or a toggle switch labelled “Live Caption”).
5. Click the CC icon or the toggle switch to disable the feature instantly.