# YouTube Transcript Scraper (Text + Timestamps, No Login) (`eddie-power-dev/youtube-transcripts`) Actor

Get YouTube transcripts as clean text plus timestamped segments from video URLs, channels or playlists. Picks your language, lists every caption language, supports auto-translation, and only charges for transcripts actually returned.

- **URL**: https://apify.com/eddie-power-dev/youtube-transcripts.md
- **Developed by:** [Eddie Power](https://apify.com/eddie-power-dev) (community)
- **Categories:** Videos, Social media, AI
- **Stats:** 2 total users, 1 monthly users, 100.0% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks
- **User rating**: No ratings yet

## Pricing

$4.00 / 1,000 transcript returneds

This Actor is paid per event. You are not charged for the Apify platform usage, but only a fixed price for specific events.

Learn more: https://docs.apify.com/actors/running/actors-in-store.md#pay-per-event

## What's an Apify Actor?

An Actor is a serverless cloud program that runs on the Apify platform. It has two run modes.
In Batch mode, an Actor accepts a well-defined JSON input, performs an action which can take anything from a few seconds to a few hours,
and optionally produces a well-defined JSON output, datasets with results, or files in key-value store.
In Standby mode, an Actor provides a web server which can be used as a website, API, or an MCP server.

Apify vocabulary and the platform model are defined once, in the agent quickstart at https://apify.com/agents.md.

## How to integrate an Actor?

If asked about integration, you help developers integrate Actors into their projects.
You adapt to their stack and deliver integrations that are safe, well-documented, and production-ready.

Do not guess an integration path. Every one of them is in the agent quickstart at https://apify.com/agents.md: the Apify MCP server, Agent Skills with the Apify CLI, the JavaScript and Python clients, the REST API, and the account-free path for an agent with no human to sign in. It also carries the rule on stating cost before the first paid run.

For examples already wired to this Actor's own input schema, see the [API](#api) section below.

Each client library has reference documentation the quickstart does not restate: [JavaScript/TypeScript](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs.md) (`npm install apify-client`) and [Python](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs.md) (`pip install apify-client`).

# README

## YouTube Transcript Scraper (Text + Timestamps, No Login)

**Turn any YouTube video into clean text.** Paste video links, a channel or a playlist, and get back the full transcript as one block of text **plus timestamped segments**, the caption language, every language the video has captions in, and the video title. No YouTube account, no API key, no cookies.

Great for:

- 🤖 **AI and RAG pipelines:** feed transcripts to ChatGPT, Claude or your own vector database
- ✍️ **Content repurposing:** turn videos into blog posts, show notes, summaries or social posts
- 🔎 **Research and monitoring:** search what a channel says across all its videos
- ♿ **Accessibility and subtitles:** export timed captions for editing

### What you get

| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| `status` | `OK`, `NO_CAPTIONS`, `UNAVAILABLE` (private, deleted, region-blocked), `BLOCKED` (YouTube bot check on every IP tried), `ERROR` or `INVALID_INPUT` |
| `title`, `channelName`, `channelId`, `durationSeconds` | Video details |
| `language`, `languageName`, `isAutoGenerated` | The caption track used |
| `availableLanguages` | Every caption track on the video (code, name, auto-generated or not) |
| `text` | The whole transcript as plain text |
| `segments` | `[{ start, duration, text }]` in seconds, for timestamps and subtitles |
| `translatedTo` | Set when you asked for YouTube's machine translation |
| `warning` | e.g. translation was rate-limited, so the original language was returned |

### Input

| Field | What to enter | Default |
|---|---|---|
| `videos` | Video URLs (watch, youtu.be, shorts, embed, live) or 11-character IDs. Up to 1,000. | – |
| `channelOrPlaylistUrls` | Channel (`youtube.com/@handle`, `/channel/UC…`) or playlist URLs. Up to 20. | – |
| `maxVideosPerSource` | Videos to take from each channel (newest first) or playlist | 20 (max 500) |
| `preferredLanguages` | Language codes in order, e.g. `en`, `es`. Human-made captions are preferred over auto-generated ones. | `en` |
| `includeAutoGenerated` | Use YouTube's automatic captions when there are no human-made ones | on |
| `translateTo` | Optional language code for YouTube's machine translation | – |
| `includeSegments` | Include the timestamped segments array | on |
| `maxConcurrency` | Videos in parallel | 3 (max 10) |
| `proxyConfiguration` | Apify Proxy. Residential is the default because YouTube bot-checks most datacenter IPs. | Apify Proxy, RESIDENTIAL |

```json
{
  "videos": ["https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNQXAC9IVRw", "dQw4w9WgXcQ"],
  "channelOrPlaylistUrls": ["https://www.youtube.com/@RickAstleyYT"],
  "maxVideosPerSource": 10,
  "preferredLanguages": ["en"]
}
```

### Example output

```json
{
  "status": "OK",
  "videoId": "jNQXAC9IVRw",
  "url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNQXAC9IVRw",
  "title": "Me at the zoo",
  "channelName": "jawed",
  "channelId": "UC4QobU6STFB0P71PMvOGN5A",
  "durationSeconds": 19,
  "language": "en",
  "languageName": "English",
  "isAutoGenerated": false,
  "translatedTo": null,
  "availableLanguages": [
    { "code": "en", "name": "English", "isAutoGenerated": false },
    { "code": "de", "name": "German", "isAutoGenerated": false }
  ],
  "text": "All right, so here we are, in front of the elephants the cool thing about these guys is that they have really... really really long trunks and that's cool (baaaaaaaaaaahhh!!) and that's pretty much all there is to say",
  "segments": [
    { "start": 1.2, "duration": 2.16, "text": "All right, so here we are, in front of the elephants" },
    { "start": 5.318, "duration": 2.656, "text": "the cool thing about these guys is that they have really..." }
  ],
  "segmentCount": 6,
  "error": null,
  "warning": null,
  "scrapedAt": "2026-10-26T10:40:00.000Z"
}
```

Export as JSON, CSV, Excel or via the API. The **Timestamped segments** view gives one row per caption line.

### Pricing

Pay per event: **you only pay for transcripts actually returned** (`status: OK`). Videos with no captions, unavailable or blocked videos, errors and invalid inputs are free. See the Pricing tab for the current price. Set a maximum cost per run and the Actor stops cleanly when it's reached.

### Limitations (please read)

- **Captions only, no speech-to-text.** If a video has no captions at all (human-made or automatic), you get `NO_CAPTIONS` and aren't charged. Very new videos may not have automatic captions yet.
- **Rate limits and bot checks.** YouTube throttles heavy traffic and shows a bot check to most datacenter IPs, so residential proxy is the default. The Actor spaces out requests, retries with backoff, rotates proxy sessions and tries several public player clients. If you still see `BLOCKED` rows or `ERROR` rows with `HTTP 429`, lower `maxConcurrency` and run again later.
- **Channels and playlists** list public videos only. Members-only, private and age-restricted videos may return `UNAVAILABLE`.
- **YouTube changes things.** This Actor reads YouTube's public caption data the same way the YouTube player does. If YouTube changes how that works, results may fail until the Actor is updated; issues reported in the Issues tab are fixed as fast as possible.
- **Machine translation** (`translateTo`) is rate-limited much more strictly by YouTube. When it fails, you get the original-language transcript with a `warning`.
- Auto-generated captions have no punctuation guarantees and can contain recognition errors.

### Responsible use

Transcripts belong to the video creators. Use them for personal research, accessibility, analysis or with the creator's permission, and follow YouTube's Terms of Service and copyright law in your country. Don't republish transcripts as your own content. This Actor is independent and not affiliated with or endorsed by YouTube or Google.

# Actor input Schema

## `videos` (type: `array`):

YouTube video links (watch, youtu.be, shorts, embed, live) or 11-character video IDs. Up to 1,000 per run.

## `channelOrPlaylistUrls` (type: `array`):

Channel URLs (youtube.com/@handle or /channel/UC...) or playlist URLs/IDs. Newest uploads first for channels. Up to 20.

## `maxVideosPerSource` (type: `integer`):

How many videos to take from each channel or playlist.

## `preferredLanguages` (type: `array`):

Language codes in order of preference, e.g. en, es, de. If none match, the video's first available track is used. The output always lists every available language.

## `includeAutoGenerated` (type: `boolean`):

Use YouTube's automatic (speech-recognition) captions when no human-made track exists. Human-made tracks are always preferred.

## `translateTo` (type: `string`):

Language code (e.g. en) to get YouTube's machine translation of the chosen track, when YouTube allows it.

## `includeSegments` (type: `boolean`):

Adds a segments array with start time, duration (seconds) and text for each caption line. Turn off for smaller output.

## `maxConcurrency` (type: `integer`):

Videos processed in parallel. Keep low to avoid YouTube rate limits.

## `proxyConfiguration` (type: `object`):

Residential Apify Proxy is the default because YouTube shows a bot check to most datacenter IPs (in our 26 Oct 2026 test, 3 of 5 videos were blocked on datacenter proxies and 0 of 5 on residential).

## Actor input object example

```json
{
  "videos": [
    "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNQXAC9IVRw"
  ],
  "maxVideosPerSource": 20,
  "preferredLanguages": [
    "en"
  ],
  "includeAutoGenerated": true,
  "includeSegments": true,
  "maxConcurrency": 3,
  "proxyConfiguration": {
    "useApifyProxy": true,
    "apifyProxyGroups": [
      "RESIDENTIAL"
    ]
  }
}
```

# Actor output Schema

## `transcripts` (type: `string`):

One row per video: transcript text, timestamped segments and metadata. Non-OK rows explain why no transcript was returned.

## `summary` (type: `string`):

Counts for the run (JSON record SUMMARY in the default key-value store).

# API

You can run this Actor programmatically using our API. Below are code examples in JavaScript, Python, and CLI, as well as the OpenAPI specification and MCP server setup.

## JavaScript example

```javascript
import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

// Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
// Replace the '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token
const client = new ApifyClient({
    token: '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>',
});

// Prepare Actor input
const input = {
    "videos": [
        "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNQXAC9IVRw"
    ],
    "preferredLanguages": [
        "en"
    ],
    "proxyConfiguration": {
        "useApifyProxy": true,
        "apifyProxyGroups": [
            "RESIDENTIAL"
        ]
    }
};

// Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
const run = await client.actor("eddie-power-dev/youtube-transcripts").call(input);

// Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if any)
console.log('Results from dataset');
console.log(`💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/${run.defaultDatasetId}`);
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
items.forEach((item) => {
    console.dir(item);
});

// 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs

```

## Python example

```python
from apify_client import ApifyClient

# Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
# Replace '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token.
client = ApifyClient("<YOUR_API_TOKEN>")

# Prepare the Actor input
run_input = {
    "videos": ["https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNQXAC9IVRw"],
    "preferredLanguages": ["en"],
    "proxyConfiguration": {
        "useApifyProxy": True,
        "apifyProxyGroups": ["RESIDENTIAL"],
    },
}

# Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
run = client.actor("eddie-power-dev/youtube-transcripts").call(run_input=run_input)

# Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if there are any)
print(f"💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/{run.default_dataset_id}")
for item in client.dataset(run.default_dataset_id).iterate_items():
    print(item)

# 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs/quick-start

```

## CLI example

```bash
echo '{
  "videos": [
    "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNQXAC9IVRw"
  ],
  "preferredLanguages": [
    "en"
  ],
  "proxyConfiguration": {
    "useApifyProxy": true,
    "apifyProxyGroups": [
      "RESIDENTIAL"
    ]
  }
}' |
apify call eddie-power-dev/youtube-transcripts --silent --output-dataset

```

## MCP server setup

```json
{
    "mcpServers": {
        "apify": {
            "type": "http",
            "url": "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=fetch-actor-details,eddie-power-dev/youtube-transcripts"
        }
    }
}
```

The hosted server signs you in with OAuth on first connect, so no API token belongs in this config. Clients without OAuth support can send an `Authorization: Bearer <APIFY_API_TOKEN>` header instead, using a token from API & Integrations in Apify Console (https://console.apify.com/settings/integrations).

## OpenAPI specification

Download the OpenAPI definition: https://api.apify.com/v2/actors/Rc58eQBOwwn9cKBCB/builds/iyoDf5aB3TTaMKPSE/openapi.json