Why is the quality of subtitles on Crunchyroll, which distributes Japanese anime overseas, declining significantly?
Crunchyroll is destroying its subtitles for no good reason | Daiz.moe
https://daiz.moe/crunchyroll-is-destroying-its-subtitles-for-no-good-reason/
Starting with the Fall 2025 anime season, reports have emerged of subtitles for anime streamed on Crunchyroll that are experiencing poor viewability and readability, including 'no subtitles at all,' 'extremely simplified subtitles,' 'small text that overlaps with the background, making it difficult to read,' and 'on-screen text (such as signs, UI, and emails) and multiple character speech appear side-by-side, making it difficult to distinguish.' Daiz.moe points out that important messages and information are often displayed only one line at a time, forcing users to frequently pause the screen to understand the content.
In contrast, here's the subtitles before the quality degradation was pointed out: The subtitles for on-screen text are displayed directly below the text, and the subtitles for character dialogue are displayed at the bottom of the screen, clearly demonstrating higher viewability and readability than the subtitles for the Fall 2025 anime.
Other efforts included using different coloured subtitles to distinguish between the speech of multiple speakers.
The process of positioning subtitles on the screen, color coding them, and sometimes changing the font is called 'typesetting.'
Until now, Crunchyroll was the only site that properly typeset Japanese anime subtitles, while most other anime streaming sites didn't even properly set the typeface. In fact, the image below compares Crunchyroll's subtitles (below) with Netflix's (above) for anime before the Fall 2025 season, and it's clear that Netflix's subtitles are extremely difficult to read and simple.
Although anime only makes up a small portion of the streaming lineups of major streaming services like Netflix and Amazon Prime Video, it's clear that a large portion of anime viewers around the world use these services to watch anime.
Crunchyroll is clearly aware of this, which is why they've been sublicensing their anime titles to Amazon Prime Video and Netflix for years now, but these sublicenses come with the problem of having to comply with the subtitle standards of popular streaming services.
For example, Netflix has a limit of 'a maximum of two lines of text displayed on the screen,' which Daiz.moe pointed out as 'the worst limit for anime subtitles.'
Therefore, to maintain its sublicenses to Netflix and Amazon Prime Video while still achieving the same excellent typesetting, Crunchyroll had to choose between 'adopting the TTML subtitle file format and negotiating to obtain permission for various features not used by its sublicensees' or 'complying with the terrible subtitle standards of common streaming services and giving up typesetting.' And, Daiz.moe points out, 'I don't know if Crunchyroll tried the former, but I can say with certainty that they ultimately did the latter.' Furthermore, Daiz.moe writes, 'This information was provided by multiple Crunchyroll employees who wished to remain anonymous.'
Crunchyroll has previously used the Advanced SubStation Alpha (ASS) file format for creating subtitles. ASS's advantage is its ability to integrate typesetting with on-screen presentation. Regarding the transition from ASS to TTML, Daiz.moe noted, 'Crunchyroll's ultimate goal is likely to be to completely eliminate its proprietary ASS-based subtitle rendering and adopt a more 'industry-standard' TTML-based subtitle rendering. This not only eliminates the need to spend labor costs on manual conversion from ASS to TTML, but also means that it can eliminate the relatively expensive full hard sub-encoding for limited playback environments where ASS rendering is not possible (although some form of TTML rendering is usually possible).'
A Crunchyroll spokesperson issued a statement to Anime News Network , an overseas anime media outlet, saying, 'Over the past few days, some users have reported delays in accessing desired content, as well as issues with subtitles not appearing for certain titles. This is not due to a change in the way we create subtitles, the introduction of a new vendor, or the use of AI, but rather an internal issue in our systems. This internal issue has now been fully resolved. High-quality subtitles are essential to watching anime on Crunchyroll. Subtitles connect fans around the world to the heart of the story, and we take that responsibility seriously.'
Regarding this, Daiz.moe pointed out, 'In response to this statement, subtitles for some of the Fall 2025 anime are being converted from ASS to TTML and then from TTML to ASS, and the future of Crunchyroll's typesetting is very uncertain.' He also said, 'If you are a Crunchyroll subscriber, please cancel your subscription. If they ask you why, explain the poor quality of the subtitles and the incomplete text. It would also be effective to spread the word about Crunchyroll's poor subtitles. This may lead to improvements in the subtitles if Crunchyroll executives are unable to ignore the subtitle issue.'
Comments on the social message board Reddit include, ' It looks like Crunchyroll has decided to compete with Netflix to see whose subtitles are worse, ' and ' Crunchyroll was the last company offering legal, easy-to-read and easy-to-see subtitles. It's a shame that America, a country with no translation culture and little interest outside of academia and Asian media fandom, is deciding what subtitles should look like. To the people who make the rules for subtitles, subtitles exist primarily for people with visual and hearing impairments; they're meant to be noticeable and not adjustable in position; your eyes aren't supposed to move. Translating on-screen text is a no-brainer for them, and it's not even a factor they consider .'
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in Web Service, Anime, Posted by logu_ii