Audio Description

High-quality and competitively priced audio description services for online video.

Why Audio Description?

Accessibility: In 2015, the National Health Interview Survey found that 23.7 million Americans, which is about 10% of the population, have trouble seeing, making audio description a critical accommodation.
Legal compliance: Audio description is required by many federal laws in the US, including the Section 508 Refresh. Providing audio description can prevent litigation and save you money down the road.
Help individuals with autism: Individuals on the autistic spectrum may find audio description helpful in understanding emotional and social cues only demonstrated through actions or facial expressions.
Helps children develop language skills: Audio description can be a useful pedagogical tool used to enhance language development in children by providing reinforcement and introducing new vocabulary.
Gives users flexibility: Audio description provides flexibility to view videos in eyes-free environments.

Audio Description Service Offerings

Synthesized speech icon with person, shifting gears, and microphone

Synthesized Speech
Choose from eighteen English voice options, three Spanish voice options, and three-speed options.

Professional Voice Artists
We offer a range of professional voice artists through a robust casting process. Choose from a variety of output formats.

Extended Audio Description
Allow for longer descriptions when there is not enough space to sufficiently describe your video.

Features & Tools

Audio Description Editor
Allows users to edit their descriptions and playback their edits.

User Platform
Order, manage and preview your description files in one convenient location.

3Play Plugin
Add audio description tracks to video players that don’t allow you to publish a separate audio track.

AD Formats
Text-based and media-based description formats, which you can access anytime.

Sephora & 3Play Media

With 3Play Media, Sephora has been able to streamline its workflow for captioning and audio description while meeting legal requirements. Sephora has been able to create an inclusive environment inside its online platform and capture an audience often missed due to online inaccessibility.

To learn how Sephora uses audio description, visit their product site and click on the video thumbnail. After the video opens, select the headphones icon and toggle the audio from “main” to “descriptive.”

Read the Case Study

Ready to give audio description a try?

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Create Compliant Videos

Many of the same accessibility laws that require closed captioning for video also require audio description.

In the US, audio description is required in many circumstances under the 21st Century Video Accessibility Act (CVAA), the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), and Section 504 and Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act.

Most web accessibility experts recommend shooting for WCAG 2.0 Level AA compliance, which requires audio description for all prerecorded video content in synchronized media.

Audio Description Laws

Laptop with closed captioning and audio description symbols in blue and magenta

Audio Description in Action: Indeed

As its accessibility statement says, “Indeed is committed to ensuring an accessible experience for all people who use our website.” Read Indeed’s accessibility statement.

As part of its internal policies, Indeed strives to meet WCAG 2.1 Level AA, which requires captioning and audio descriptions on videos. Indeed’s YouTube account is full of amazing examples of audio descriptions, like the following video:

Audio Description Embed

EASILY PUBLISH AUDIO DESCRIPTION ANYWHERE
The 3Play Plugin enables users to add captions, interactive transcripts, audio description, and SEO to videos they don’t own and to video players that otherwise don’t support these features.

With the 3Play Plugin, you can add audio description to videos without having to republish your audio or video files.

You can toggle audio description on or off and change the volume of the description separately from the volume of your original audio track.

Players that Support Audio Description

Ready to Get Started?

View Audio Description Packages

Spanish & English Audio Description

In addition to our English audio description service, we also offer Spanish audio description for Spanish language transcripts, imports, and ASR files (automated speech recognition).
Learn more about ordering Spanish audio description.
Spanish Audio Description can ONLY be ordered if the source video file is in Spanish.

Pink world

Companies everywhere are creating accessible video.

See our case studies →

“Accessibility is really important for Perkins. We’re a community of people with a lot of different disabilities and needs, and I think 3Play has been very forward-thinking about this and a thought leader.”

Robin Sitten l eLearning Program Manager