What the Two Forms Look Like
Form B: two cues on the same timeline. One line of dialogue becomes two separate subtitle cues with identical timing — one English, one Chinese — drawn stacked on top of each other. This is the most common way bilingual ASS subtitles are built.
- `What are you waiting for?`
- `你还在等什么？`
Where Each One Falls Short
Form A’s weak point is detection: splitting the tracks relies on the writing system, so Chinese-English or Japanese-English pairs separate at a glance, while combinations that share a single script — English plus French, or Chinese plus Japanese kanji — cannot be told apart. Form B’s weak point is production: the two timelines must match exactly and aligning them by hand is tiring; some players also draw both same-timeline cues, crowding the screen. Rule of thumb: use Form A for finished subtitles meant for viewers; use Form B when you need to pull the tracks apart for further work.
The Two Routes
Build bilingual subtitles from the original: use AI Subtitle Translation and pick “Bilingual · original on top” or “Bilingual · translation on top” on export — you get Form A directly; choosing ASS also offers two layouts, “stacked top and bottom” and “two lines at the bottom”.
Merge two tracks or convert between forms: use Bilingual Subtitle Stripper and its “merge into one two-line entry” mode — Form B in, Form A out; going the other way, “split into two files” takes Form A or B in and gives two independent tracks out.
Which Device Will Play It
Web players (HTML5 `<track>`) and most mobile players handle Form A more reliably; desktop players (VLC, mpv, PotPlayer) accept both and can even give the two same-timeline cues different colours and positions. When in doubt, export Form A as SRT — it travels best. For the differences between the formats themselves, see SRT, VTT or ASS: Which Should You Use.
FAQ
Bilingual subtitles look cramped — what can I do? Control the line width: the translation tool’s export panel has a “bilingual line width” setting; a narrower line means fewer characters per cue and a cleaner screen.
I only want one track. The stripper’s “keep original only / keep translation only” handles it in one click, see Split Bilingual Subtitles into Two Tracks.