Can you get closed captioning over HDMI with DIRECTV?

This is one of those weird ones. I guess I’ll start out by telling you the answer to this specific question is “no.” But that doesn’t mean you don’t have access to closed captioning. In order to understand this whole mess, you need to have a bunch of background information about captioning and why it is the way it is.

A little history of closed captioning

Closed captioning is different from “open captioning” which means captions you can see all the time. Closed captioning is captioning that you have to turn on. It was originally intended only to be used by the hearing-impaired. After trials throughout the 1970s, closed captioning was added to all broadcast programming in the 1980s. However, it required a separate box to be used. It wasn’t until 1993 that all TVs sold were required to have closed captioning built in

Before high definition, a lot of televisions had a neat feature. If you muted the sound, the captions would come on automatically. It was a friendly use of the closed captioning system that’s required on all televisions for the use of people who can’t hear. Since closed captioning was required by law, TV makers figured they’d turn it into a feature for everyone. It makes sense.

So what happened?

Try muting your TV while you’re watching. Chances are you won’t see any captions. So what gives? The truth is most TVs still have that feature, but most of us don’t use it. Why? HDMI. If your DIRECTV equipment is connected via that friendly HDMI cable, closed captioning doesn’t work on your TV. Why? Because legally, it doesn’t have to.

Legally, if the receiver or DVR itself is capable of putting out closed captions, then it doesn’t have to pass captions over the HDMI cable. Passing closed captioning over HDMI isn’t impossible, but it does take some extra work to accomplish. It’s easier to generate the captions in the receiver and then put the entire image, captions and all, out to the TV. So that’s what pretty much everyone does.

Enabling Closed Captioning on DIRECTV systems

If you want to see captions on your DIRECTV receiver, press the INFO button on live television and arrow over to the Captioning or CC menu. From there you can choose DIRECTV Captions or Closed Captions, which are both really similar except the DIRECTV Captions give you some extra stuff that isn’t strictly legal with closed captioning (which is regulated by the government.) Generally, DIRECTV Subtitles will look better, but you can do customizations on Closed Captioning if you like it larger or even a different font.

The only thing is your DIRECTV receiver doesn’t know when you mute the TV so it can’t turn them on automatically. It wouldn’t be impossible for a DIRECTV remote to send a signal to the receiver when you press MUTE but, the thing is, it doesn’t and it probably never will.

Is there a workaround for this?

If you use a component connection from your HD receiver, you will get closed captioning data to the TV, but you also end up with a big bulky cable and five different RCA connections, and that assumes that the TV can still take component connections. Most TVs made in the last few years either can’t do this or require some sort of adapter to do it.

So, this one falls under, “sometimes you win sometimes you lose.” Those friendly captions that turned on when you muted the TV don’t happen automatically. I still wish they did, but it’s no reason to go back to an old standard definition receiver just to make it happen.

In the meantime, if you’re looking for a new DIRECTV box or anything to help you live your best digital life, shop the great selection at Solid Signal! If you need help or advice, call us at 888-233-7563 during East Coast office hours.

About the Author

Stuart Sweet
Stuart Sweet is the editor-in-chief of The Solid Signal Blog and a "master plumber" at Signal Group, LLC. He is the author of over 10,000 articles and longform tutorials including many posted here. Reach him by clicking on "Contact the Editor" at the bottom of this page.