Features, settings & updates

[josh44s]

I have a newer Roku Ultra and this is definitely a Roku bug:

- My Roku IS setup with Accessibility->Captions Mode->OFF.
- Every show I watch on every channel, I have to turn subtitles off. This is maddening.
- When I launch a channel and watch a show, subtitles are turned back ON again.

Since this problem is happening on every channel, it's obviously not a channel problem. It's a Roku problem.

@Roku - please fix this.

[GregLakes]

Soemhow I fixed mine nearly 2years ago but can't remember how. Try unplugging the TV for 1 a minute or so

[MelanieKo]

Thanks for the suggestion GregLakes but unplugging it definitely isn’t the solution.

I’ve worked for a couple tech companies and I know that’s a suggestion for many computer glitches but, my devices get unplugged often for one reason or another and that doesn’t help.

Regardless, the consensus is: We, as consumers, would appreciate a system fix instead of spotty trial and error. 

[discodamien]

Karla, after two-plus years and 21 pages of comments, it is clear that the Closed Caption issue is not in the app, nor is it able to be corrected in the settings. This is a global and hardware-wide issue and clearly resides within the Roku system software. We ask that Roku be more communicative regarding this problem.

[gypsyBytes]

Yes, it's absolutely a bug buried deep in the tech. Same thing happens with my Visio smart TV. 

[RokuDanny-R]

Hi Community users,

Other customers who have reported resolving this issue stated that they found the channel that had the subtitles within the channel enabled and once they turned off subtitles, they were able to disable them from being enabled on all of their channels.

If you are still experiencing an issue, can you please provide us the following information:

• Roku device model, serial number, device ID, and software OS/version (these can all be found in Settings > System > About)
• does this issue occur on a specific channel? if so, what channel and what version/build is the channel (this can be found be selecting the channel on the Home screen and pressing the * button)
• tracker ID when this issue occurs (when you see this issue occur, press the Home button 5 times, followed by the Back button 5 times and provide us with this ID)
• steps to reproduce the issue you are seeing 

Once we have this information, we will be able to pass it along to the appropriate Roku team to investigate further.

Thanks,
Danny

[Michele57]

We have one person in the house who uses subtitles. They always use them on the same device and no others, and they have their own unshared profiles on shared subscriptions.

Since about December, their subtitles frequently go off AND subtitles turn on for other profiles and users *not* using a Roku device. Multiple streaming services are affected.

Even though the Roku setting is "On always," captions that were actually always on for years without any issues now get turned off constantly and are sometimes difficult to restore, because all settings within the app and the Roku are set to captions on,  but they are off. Restarting the app and sometimes the Roku, then manually checking all the settings again is sometimes the only way to restore them.

There has to be one or more streaming channels that is breaching the lines between profiles and/or apps to cause this very new-to-us problem. How else could the problem be "device jumping" to non-Roku equipment abd onto different users' profiles?

Here is a list of all multiple user apps in our household. Listed apps with a * were added or upgraded fairly recently.

*Curiosity Stream

Disney+

Freevee

HBO Max

*Hulu

*Netflix

*Paramount+

*PBS Passport

*Peacock

Pluto TV

Prime Video

Tubi

YouTube

 (We do also stream additional channels by logging in, as individual users, to devices through our cable provider, Armstrong. This has been done without issue for multiple years, but I don't want to rule it out and fail to mention it, just in case it could be the source of the problem.)

Please help! I have older family members who are not able to manage this problem easily. We have done all of the manual checking and resetting and troubleshooting and nothing has worked. If there's something we can do to make this stop, GREAT! But please, figure this out and push a fix or tell us what that thing we need to do is! I'm out of ideas. Clearly, we're not the only ones dealing with this problem, or this thread wouldn't exist. I repeat my plea: HELP!

[Dan-Miller · Accepted solution]

So I fixed it. At least on my devices (two of the newer Ultra boxes, the ones that do Dolby Vision). There might be other symptoms on other streamers or the TV, but I'll share what happened and what I did.

I was having the same symptoms as much of what I have read here. The captions were always on upon starting something. If I turned them off in the app itself, they stayed off for the duration of the show I was watching, but only if I continued straight through. When the next episode began, they were on again. Even if I paused to take a leak, they would return upon restart. If I turned them off globally in the menu, it was useless. They would be on in the show and then if I returned to the global settings it was as if I had never made the change.

The one thing that helped me was that this is a fairly recent problem. Up until last month this never happened. What happened last month? Well, for me I got rid of my cable service and wanted to see if any of the live TV apps made sense. So I tried them. Sling, Fubo TV, Philo and YouTube TV. I ended up not using any of them - but I didn't delete them. So yesterday I did. The problem is GONE.

Someone either in this thread or one of the others had mentioned Sling, and that's what made me try this. I don't know which of those apps were the trigger and frankly I don't care. This is Roku's problem. I feel bad for saying that because I'm a video product engineer for a major manufacturer and it's in my nature to get to the root of these things. But I don't have access to the code for Roku, and I'm sure they have people who actually get paid to debug these problems. But if this "fix" can help some of you or one of the Roku coders, then good. 

As always, YMMV.

Good luck Roku team...

Dan

Roku Ultra (4800 series)