Why do my Arabic subtitles show disconnected letters?

Nothing in the pipeline performed letter shaping. Arabic letters take different forms depending on their position in a word, and a renderer that draws characters one by one leaves every letter in its isolated form. Render the captions through a real text engine with a font that has full Arabic coverage.

Why does my Arabic text appear backwards?

The tool most likely reversed the character order instead of running the Unicode bidirectional algorithm. That makes plain Arabic lines look fine while breaking anything mixed, such as numbers, Latin brand names and brackets.

What font should I use for Arabic subtitles?

One with full Arabic presentation-form coverage, which rules out many display fonts. The Noto Sans Arabic family is a dependable choice. Whatever you pick, make sure it is embedded in the export so no fallback font fills gaps.

How can I check Arabic subtitles if I do not read Arabic?

Check four things by eye: the letters join into continuous strokes, the line starts at the right-hand edge, the period sits at the left-hand end, and any digits read in the right order. Those four catch nearly every rendering failure.

Can Vidpop make a video ad fully in Arabic?

Yes, on the Pro plan. The script, the voiceover and the burned-in captions can all be in Arabic, and the captions join up and read right to left properly. You can choose from 7 Arabic voices in Saudi, Kuwaiti, Omani and Egyptian accents.

Should Arabic subtitles be in standard Arabic or a dialect?

Standard Arabic (fusha) travels across the region and is the safer default for a broad audience. A dialect reads warmer locally and stranger elsewhere. Whichever you pick, keep it the same through the whole video.

Do subtitle files support Arabic?

Yes, as long as the file is saved as UTF-8. The player then does the shaping and right-to-left layout. The bigger risk is burned-in captions, where the video tool draws the text itself, so check the exported video with the visual tests above.

Guide

Adding Arabic subtitles that actually join up

Updated 27 September 2026

You export a video with Arabic captions, open it, and the text looks wrong. The letters sit apart like separate beads. The line seems to read backwards, or a word has turned into an empty box. The translation is usually fine. The problem is rendering, and it has two specific causes. Once you know them, you can spot a broken caption in a few seconds, even if you do not read Arabic.

Why Arabic breaks when Latin text does not

Two things make Arabic harder to render than English, and many tools get only one of them right.

Letter shaping. An Arabic letter changes form depending on where it sits in a word: one shape at the start, another in the middle, another at the end, and one standing alone. These are called presentation forms. Unicode stores the abstract letter, so something in the pipeline has to pick the right form for each position and join the strokes. If nothing does, every letter comes out in its isolated form. You get recognizable characters with no joins, and a native reader will call the text broken.

Right-to-left layout. Arabic reads right to left, but numbers inside it read left to right, and so does embedded Latin text like a brand name or a URL. The Unicode bidirectional algorithm decides the visual order of a mixed line. A tool that skips it and just reverses the characters makes simple lines look fine and mixed lines badly wrong: phone numbers reversed, brackets facing the wrong way, a Latin product name spelled backwards.

A third failure catches even tools that handle both: order of operations. Line wrapping has to be decided on the logical text first, and each line then shaped on its own. A pipeline that shapes and reorders the whole paragraph, then cuts it into lines by width, produces two lines that each look correctly joined but read scrambled together. At a glance, nothing looks wrong.

Step by step: getting Arabic subtitles right

01Start from the audio, not from your English script. Caption text should match what was actually said. Caption from a translated script and any rephrase leaves text on screen that contradicts the audio.
02Pick standard Arabic (fusha) or a dialect, and stay with it. Standard Arabic travels across the region. A Gulf or Egyptian dialect reads warmer locally and stranger elsewhere. Do not mix them inside one video.
03Choose a font with full Arabic coverage before you choose one that looks nice. Many display fonts include a partial Arabic set and quietly drop presentation forms. The Noto Sans Arabic family is a reliable starting point because its coverage is complete.
04Use a real text engine. A routine that positions characters one by one skips shaping. Browser rendering or a proper text-layout library is fine. A hand-rolled canvas loop is not.
05Wrap on the logical text, then shape each line. If you control the pipeline, this order matters most: break lines on word boundaries in reading order first, then shape and lay out each line separately.
06Keep lines short. Two lines at most, with fewer characters per line than in English, since joined Arabic script is denser at the same point size.
07Render one test caption on purpose. Put in a joined multi-letter word, a number, a Latin brand name and a period. Those four elements expose every failure above. Check it at real size on a phone.
08Have someone who reads Arabic look at it once. Ten seconds from a native reader catches what no checklist does.

How to check your output without reading Arabic

You do not need the language to audit the rendering. Every check below is visual.

Do the letters touch? Connected Arabic writing has continuous strokes running through most of a word. A line of evenly spaced, floating characters is broken.
Does the line start on the right? The caption's first word should sit at the right-hand edge. Text hugging the left edge on a short line means the direction is wrong.
Where is the period? In Arabic it belongs at the left-hand end of the line. A period on the right is a bidirectional bug.
Read any number out loud. Digits inside Arabic still run left to right, so a reversed phone number or price is the fastest tell. Parentheses should mirror too.
Is it all one font? Look for a letter that is heavier, thinner or shaped differently from its neighbors. That is font fallback filling a coverage gap.
Do two-line captions read in order? Ask a reader to confirm line one continues into line two. This failure survives every other check.

A language list is not a rendering test

Many AI video tools list Arabic as a supported language. That usually describes the voice. It tells you little about how burned-in Arabic text is drawn on screen. Before you publish, run the visual checks above on your own export, whichever tool made it.

Arabic video ads in Vidpop

Vidpop is an iPhone app that runs your social media. On the Pro plan it also makes UGC video ads, and those can be fully Arabic: the AI-written script, the voiceover and the burned-in captions. Arabic captions join up and read right to left properly. There are 7 Arabic voices in Saudi, Kuwaiti, Omani and Egyptian accents, and 4 of the 11 AI presenters speak Arabic.

Video is a Pro feature: $16.99 a week or $59.99 a month in the US App Store, with 1 video a week plus 1 redo. Videos are 720 × 1280, 9:16, up to 30 seconds. The app's own interface is in English, even when the video is in Arabic. It runs on iPhone with iOS 17 or later, with no Android app and no web version. More on the video side here.

Vidpop also posts for you each week

Beyond video, Autopilot plans 3 designed carousels a week around your business, writes a caption for each, and posts them at the scheduled time, or waits for your approval if you turn on "Ask me first". Post for Me publishes to Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn and TikTok, right away or on a schedule.

One thing to know if your audience reads Arabic: carousels and their captions are written in English for now. Arabic is available for videos. Both plans are on the pricing section.

What goes wrong, and the fix

Letters are separated in the export but fine in the editor preview. The two use different renderers. Trust the export, and check whether it embeds the same font.
One word turned into empty boxes, or the caption looks right on desktop and wrong on a phone. Both are font coverage gaps. Switch to a font with a complete Arabic set and make sure it is embedded.
Numbers are reversed. The tool reversed the string instead of applying bidirectional layout. No setting fixes this. The tool has to change.
Everything joins but a two-line caption reads out of order. Wrapping happened after reordering. Shorten the caption to one line as a quick workaround.
A subtitle file looks fine in a player but breaks when burned in. Players do their own shaping and layout, so a separate subtitle file is often correct while burn-in is not. Look at the burn-in step.
The captions do not match the audio. They came from a translated script rather than the delivered voiceover. Caption from the audio.

Frequently asked questions

Why do my Arabic subtitles show disconnected letters?: Nothing in the pipeline performed letter shaping. Arabic letters take different forms depending on their position in a word, and a renderer that draws characters one by one leaves every letter in its isolated form. Render the captions through a real text engine with a font that has full Arabic coverage.
Why does my Arabic text appear backwards?: The tool most likely reversed the character order instead of running the Unicode bidirectional algorithm. That makes plain Arabic lines look fine while breaking anything mixed, such as numbers, Latin brand names and brackets.
What font should I use for Arabic subtitles?: One with full Arabic presentation-form coverage, which rules out many display fonts. The Noto Sans Arabic family is a dependable choice. Whatever you pick, make sure it is embedded in the export so no fallback font fills gaps.
How can I check Arabic subtitles if I do not read Arabic?: Check four things by eye: the letters join into continuous strokes, the line starts at the right-hand edge, the period sits at the left-hand end, and any digits read in the right order. Those four catch nearly every rendering failure.
Can Vidpop make a video ad fully in Arabic?: Yes, on the Pro plan. The script, the voiceover and the burned-in captions can all be in Arabic, and the captions join up and read right to left properly. You can choose from 7 Arabic voices in Saudi, Kuwaiti, Omani and Egyptian accents.
Are Vidpop's Autopilot posts in Arabic?: Not yet. Autopilot carousels and post captions are written in English for now. Arabic is available for videos, which are on the Pro plan.
Should Arabic subtitles be in standard Arabic or a dialect?: Standard Arabic (fusha) travels across the region and is the safer default for a broad audience. A dialect reads warmer locally and stranger elsewhere. Whichever you pick, keep it the same through the whole video.
Do subtitle files support Arabic?: Yes, as long as the file is saved as UTF-8. The player then does the shaping and right-to-left layout. The bigger risk is burned-in captions, where the video tool draws the text itself, so check the exported video with the visual tests above.

Try it on your own app or product

Free to download on iPhone. A subscription is needed to render a reel.