Google Chrome's real-time captions are now available on PC and Mac

Google has been testing Live Captions for Chrome on desktop since May last year when the feature first showed up on Chrome Canary. Now, all Chrome users on PC can take advantage of real-time captioning, so long as they install version 89 of the browser's stable build. As noticed by XDA Developers, the latest version of the browser has a new Accessibility section under Advanced in Preferences that'll let users toggle on Live Captions. Upon switching it on, they'll see subtitles for any audio and video they play on their browser that's in the English language.

When the tech giant launched Live Captions in 2019, it was initially available for the Pixel 4 only. It eventually made its way to other Pixel models before becoming available on other mobile devices, such as the Galaxy S20 and the OnePlus 8. Also, it didn't work for phone calls at first, only on any media that plays audio. Almost a year after it came out, though, Google unveiled Live Caption for calls on Pixel devices.

We successfully tested the feature using videos on YouTube and Facebook and can confirm XDA's observation that it will work even if the video is muted. At this point in time, however, the audio has to be in English — it doesn't recognize any other language yet. The captions appear in a window at the bottom of the screen, which users can expand or close if they don't need it.