Open SRT File

SRT File Problems

SRT files are subtitle files created by the SubRip software, which extracts, using character recognition, subtitles from a video file and saves them in a plain text file with the extension .srt.

When we talk about "opening an SRT file" we specifically refer to opening it for editing. Opening an SRT file to play it is the subject of another article, included in this website.

Problems accessing or opening an SRT file can be due to a number of reasons. Fortunately, you don't need in-depth IT knowledge to troubleshoot opening an SRT file, and more importantly, it can be done in a matter of minutes. The list below will guide you through the process of addressing the problem encountered.

The most common problems when opening an SRT file are the following:

• 1) Make sure the SRT file is complete and free of errors. Although SRT files are plain text files, they must follow a specific format that will tell the player what the proper text is.
• 2) Verify that the file is not infected with any virus or malicious software. Although rare, it is possible for a caption file to be infected with malware. To verify this, just have the antivirus software updated and do a previous scan of the SRT file.
• 3) The extension is not associated with any text editing software. This problem is more common than you think and occurs when there is an error in the installation/uninstallation of a program related to editing SRT files. To correct it, it is not necessary to do any editing of the Windows registry. Instead you need to right click on any SRT file and then click "Open with…" and choose NotePad or WordPad. Optionally you can choose "Always use this application to open SRT files" and the extension will be associated with the software automatically for further usage.
• 4) The file has an unrecognized encoding. This occurs when the file has an encoding not recognized by the operating system, and therefore only unrecognizable characters will appear. The best solution is to request and/or download the file again, making sure that it uses at least Unicode or UTF-8 encoding.
• 5) The file is damaged or corrupted. Downloading the file again from a trusted source should be sufficient.