Zoom offers free automatic captions for all accounts, including free accounts but…

[Mary Beth]

Zoom has now released free automatic captions on all zoom accounts, including free accounts

BUT

this feature must be first ENABLED in the host’s account via the web portal.  This is needed once.  However lacking to do this step as a HOST, prevents the free captions from being available during the meeting.  Details on how to enable free captions can be found in the link .

https://blog.zoom.us/zoom-auto-generated-captions/?fbclid=IwAR36rPR_q5aiNhSZG9PfNntZJ0GfzJ9ZoWUSdoeIgysXMpBi_m2hV7bUqa0
 

IF the host has completed the one time step of enabling automatic captions, then the HOST can easily turn on that feature for a meeting.  
 

Note that the participants can not turn on these free automatic captions unless both the feature has already been enabled by the host AND the host turns on the feature for the meeting.