Subtitle size on Google Pixel 6

[SubtitleUser]

Hello, the subtitles on NowTV are absolutely tiny on my phone app. Using a Google Pixel 6 and have tried changing the phone's caption preferences in the accessibility settings but it hasn't made a difference. Subtitle size is fine when watching on smart TV. Any idea how to fix the subtitle size on my phone app? Thanks

[Saint1976]

@SubtitleUser this has been discussed a number of times recently. It seems to depend from device to device whether the subtitles size can be changed.

https://community.nowtv.com/t5/Mobile/Tiny-subtitles/m-p/603584#M5413

https://community.nowtv.com/t5/Setup-Performance/Subtitles-when-provided-are-far-too-small-to-read-P...

@Simon-J can this be looked into as it's the 3rd thread in a few weeks?

[SubtitleUser]

Thank you for replying, had a look through those threads and agree seems to depend on device. Would appreciate @Simon-J looking into it

[commanda6 · Accepted solution]

Hi @SubtitleUser @Saint1976 

I have been having a bit of a play around with the now app on android phone and tablet

It seems the phone and tablet app for Android is very picky about what caption preferences it will follow and what caption preferences it will not. Inside the captain preferences there are two main options that affect subtitled appearance, 'caption size' and 'caption style' and then inside caption style you have lots of sub options.

it seems that in order to get the app to follow the caption size settings the caption style settings must be set to 'set by app' if you try to override the captions style settings in any way then the captions size settings will not be followed I think it's fair to say this is a bug and a rather a strange one. Below is how to get to caption size and style preferences on Motorola/ Lenovo devices unfortunately devices from different manufacturers could be laid out a bit differently.

Settings > accessibility > caption preferences > caption size and style

Note that caption preferences must be switched on in order for any of these settings to take effect.

Hope this helps 😀

[SubtitleUser]

Thanks for having a try at working this out - no option to set captions via app on my Pixel 6 unfortunately 

[Saint1976]

@commanda6 good find and yes that works on OnePlus 7t. It's a bit of a faff really given that all other streaming apps I've used to test simply follow the caption size option. This is either a conscious decision from the developers or an oversight that has complicated the process of changing text size. If for any reason that is the only option available to the developers the simple fix would to be change the text size in the code for the default option given that it's way smaller than other apps that are set to the default size.

Your next task is to work out how to get the subtitles size to change on pc! 😉

[RoyB]

@commanda6 

Good catch!

My Samsung A53 doesn’t have ‘Set by App’ as a style option, but it has six options: Default, four text/background colour combinations, and Custom.

Default does let the Size option work.

But once it has worked, if you go back to the other options, then you can change the colours, but the Size option no longer allows altering, it just stays  at the last setting it let you have.

So a little more complicated than you describe, but you can get any combination you want:-

Set Style to Default. Pick the Size you want. It will be respected.

Set Style to whatever you want. Every setting, except Size in Custom, will be respected. Size will remain whatever you picked above, once Style is set differently from Default, even if you change Size directly.

To change Size in the future, note how Style is set, set Style to Default, change Size, and finally put Style back to the setting(s) you noted.

As ever, there are seemingly as many Android skins as there are models of smartphone, so YMMV.

[commanda6]

Unfortunately your extra steps to get the app to follow the style settings must be a quirk of Samsung devices @RoyB. It did not work for me. but at least we know how to prevent microscopic subtitles.

[RoyB]

@commanda6 

You remind me why I prefer Apple devices 😛

However, I run one Android device, because Apple’s usually praiseworthy approach to privacy outlaws essential apps like WiFi Analyzer, and means that Fing can only supply a cutdown version on iOS 😢

[commanda6]

Myself and @RoyB  are not talking about functionality which sit inside of a now app we are talking about the Android system settings for subtitles here@SubtitleUser 

Caption preferences must be enabled first before the now app will follow them and as I have been finding out the app will respect the captions size settings as long as the settings for caption style are on 'set by app'

Settings > aaccessibility > caption preferences

Remember though that the system settings menus for different manufacturers of Android devices will be laid out differently this is unfortunately one of the pitfalls of Android but the options will be there somewhere.