To provide multilingual and multicultural television services that inform, educate and entertain all Australians, SBS’s television services include captioned and audio described programming in English, as well as the subtitling of non-English programming.

Subtitling

Subtitles enable audiences, regardless of their cultural provenance, to access in-language programming shown on SBS.

Programs in a language other than English (other than WorldWatch) are made accessible to a wider Australian audience through English subtitles. SBS predominantly uses subtitles, rather than voice over or dubbing, as subtitling retains the linguistic and cultural integrity of the original programs and allows for effective cross-cultural communication.

In the last 12 months, SBS increased the volume of subtitling of SBS’s original television productions so that multicultural communities can enjoy more TV programs in their first language, alongside SBS’s unrivalled in-language radio services.

Among this offering, series such as The Hunting and Filthy Rich & Homeless were subtitled into Arabic and Simplified Chinese.

*Only includes programs subtitled in-house by SBS

Audio Description

SBS is committed to making its content accessible to all Australians, and recognises that audio description can provide meaningful benefits to blind or vision-impaired Australians by increasing access to these stories.

SBS launched audio description services on 28 June 2020, following a trial of its services from 5 April 2020, and is providing an average of 14 hours of audio described programming each week. SBS broadcast a total of 143.5 hours of audio described programming on SBS and SBS VICELAND during this trial period as it obtained feedback from audiences.

See Audio Description for further information about SBS’s audio description offering.