( Obviously, if you’re vision-impaired or have reading difficulties then the English dubbing track is a valid option.
Because you’re missing out on some really engrossing series from around the world – seen and heard as it was made. So, put down your second screen, save the laundry folding for that Friends rewatch you should really abandon, and embrace the subtitles.
Ninety per cent of Dark's viewership was outside of Germany, speaking to the power of a global platform in disseminating stories outside of the original country but you’re not getting even close to the full experience if you have the dubbing on. To bypass the original language version – besides the distracting, disfluent imagery of watching people speak one thing only to hear another – is to miss half the performance from the actors.
So, what you’re initially presented with is the version many accept.Īccording to Netflix data, 78 per cent of audiences watched German series Dark with dubbing on while 72 per cent watched Spanish series Money Heist with a dubbed audio track.Īccording to a Variety feature in 2018, Netflix chooses to default to the English dubbing track because it found that American audiences were more likely to finish a non-English language series when presented with the dubbed version than in the original language with subtitles.īut that’s Americans. Why? Because Netflix defaults to the English dubbing track on shows such as the French Call My Agent or Spanish Cable Girls.Īnd for a lot of Netflix users, they don’t question it, especially when on other series such as the Japanese Terrace House, there is no English dubbing track. It’s an easy enough feature to miss, even to people who have been using Netflix’s platform for many years.
Which is what many people have done because there’s a vast chunk of Netflix’s audience that don’t realise you can watch non-English language titles in their original language with English subtitles. Back in October, we shared news about Hulu agreeing to provide an audio feed for people with visual disabilities to make the streaming service more accessible for viewers with disabilities. Maybe you then logged onto Netflix and pressed play on Lupin, Money Heist, Dark or decided to finally catch up on Borgen, only to be confronted with a terrible dubbing track.Īll those unmatched lips? It’s enough to make you give it up immediately. You can listen to an audio description during a video to help you enjoy a program if you're visually impaired, or when you're unable to look at your screen. Heard about that great new French series about a master thief? What about the Spanish heist show? An audio description is a separate audio track that narrates or describes the visual content of a clip, show, or movie.