How to display two subtitles simultaneously in VLC on Windows 11/10

You can choose to display two subtitles simultaneously on the screen if you are running VLC media player. Yes, it’s possible. However, there’s a trick you’ll need to play. The process requires the installation of an extension – Subtitler Lite and a tool – Key Presser.

For a bilingual or multilingual community, displaying just one subtitle language in VLC player on Windows 10 isn’t enough to cater most viewers. As such, having the ability to display two subtitles in VLC player on Windows 11/10 could be beneficial as well as desirable. The subtitle currently VLC have is named primary subtitle and the new one the secondary subtitle. The soundtrack mainly comes from the primary one.

Display two subtitles simultaneously in VLC

To display two subtitles simultaneously in VLC, you’ll need to perform three steps.

1. Download your subtitle files
2. Download the Subtitler (lite) mod extension for VLC
3. Download and install Key Presser.

The process is somewhat tedious, so, you’ll have to bear with the steps.

1] Download your subtitle files

A subtitle file is compatible with any media player that supports it. If you want to add two subtitles to VLC player, you’ll have to load the first file natively through VLC’s built-in feature. The second subtitle file you can choose to load via a VLC plugin, but you should make sure that it has the name matching correctly with the video currently playing.

2] Download Subtitler Lite (mod) extension for VLC

It is VLC extension that displays subtitles on the screen in a playing video and a dialog box. It lets users watch a film with two different subtitles. For convenience, we have added the two subtitles for the same language, i.e., English. However, you can select the language of your choice. For instance, you can configure VLC player to display Subtitles in English and the other in, say, French.

Once downloaded, extract (unzip) the .lua file and put it in the VLC subdirectory /lua/extensions, by default: ‘Windows (current user): %APPDATA%VLC lua extensions‘.

When done, all you need to do is open the video you want to play and access the VLC player’s built-in option to play the initial subtitle file.

Next, you need to go to the ‘View’ tab located in the top portion of the player >Subtitle Lite on the toolbar.

The action, when confirmed, will open a small window that displays the ‘Refresh’ button. This button requires constant pressing to force it to load the second subtitle file. You can automate this process by installing another handy app – Key Presser.

3] Download, install & use Key Presser

KeyPresser is an extremely lightweight tool and easy to use application that automates the operation of pressing a previously assigned key inside the selected Windows application such as VLC player.

To configure Key Presser for Subtitle Lite, run Key Presser and from the app list dropdown, select Subtitle Lite. In the Key field, select Enter from the dropdown.

Moving to the Time Interval field, enter the desired value – 100ms. Click Start! Make sure the Subtitle Lite window is the active window on your screen.

After a few seconds, you should notice the second subtitle file loading and Subtitle Lite will be refreshed constantly by Key Presser so that the subtitles are loaded as the video plays.

Let us know if you can get it to work.