[BUG]: External Subtitles Not Working in Latest Versions (`onTextTracks` returns null)

[mrrobot-XX]

What happened?

A breaking regression affecting all versions after 6.15.0: external subtitles (VTT/SRT) do not load.

Working version: react-native-video@6.15.0

Broken versions (tested): 6.16.0, 6.17.0, 6.18.0 (latest)

Issue Description

External subtitles (VTT/SRT) do not load in the latest versions.

• The video plays normally, but subtitles never display.
• onTextTracks() returns null or an empty array.
• No subtitle item appears for selection.
• Selecting subtitle manually also does nothing.

The same code works perfectly on version 6.15.0, so this is a regression.

Code Example (Working only on 6.15.0)

<Video
  useExoPlayer={true}
  source={{ uri: videoUrl }}
  textTracks={[
    {
      title: "English",
      language: "en",
      type: TextTrackType.VTT,
      uri: subtitleUrl,
    },
  ]}
  selectedTextTrack={{
    type: "index",
    value: 0,
  }}
  onTextTracks={(tracks) => {
    console.log("Subtitle tracks:", tracks);
  }}
/>

Current Behavior (Bug)

• onTextTracks → returns: null or []
• Subtitles never appear
• Cannot select subs or display them at runtime

Expected Behavior

• textTracks should load the external subtitle file
• onTextTracks should return available subtitle tracks
• Selected subtitle should be displayed during playback (like in 6.15.0)

Notes

This affects:

• Android (ExoPlayer path)
• External subtitles (not embedded)
• .vtt, .srt, .vtt remote URLs

Impact

This breaks accessibility and multilingual playback support. Many streaming apps rely on subtitles — so this is a major regression.

Request

Please fix this subtitle regression in the latest version or provide guidance / patch. Available to test builds and provide logs if needed.

Steps to reproduce

1. Use react-native-video 6.16.0 or later on Android (ExoPlayer path).
2. Render a <Video> component with an external subtitle file passed via the textTracks prop (e.g. a remote .vtt/.srt URI) and selectedTextTrack set to index 0.
3. Play the video and observe onTextTracks returns null or []; no subtitles display and none can be selected.
4. Downgrade to 6.15.0 with the same code — subtitles load and display correctly.

Reproduction repository

No response

react-native-video version

6.18.0

react-native version

No response

react-native-nitro-modules version

No response

Platforms

Android

OS version

Android 12

Device

Real device

Architecture

Old Architecture

Expo

No response

Last working version

6.15.0

Media / source type

Other

[github-actions]

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[2004durgesh]

This PR fixes this issue
For a similar issue, see #4614.

As a temporary workaround until this PR is merged, use:

"react-native-video": "github:pigeonmal/react-native-video#ajami1.4.1"

Then remove the Expo plugin, as it will not work.
Keep the native configurations intact.

atlast do

npm run android # to build the project

[mrrobot-XX]

@2004durgesh Thanks a lot, I’ll test this and let you know.

[TWG-AI]

Thanks for this detailed report — the regression window (6.15.0 working → 6.16.0 broken) is very helpful.

This has been logged for the team to investigate the Android text track regression. External subtitles are an important accessibility feature, and we want to get this resolved.

In the meantime, if downgrading to 6.15.0 is possible in your project, that appears to be the only known workaround while the fix is worked on.

Note: I'm an automated triage assistant — verify anything specific I've mentioned against the docs or your setup.