📺 YouTube Transcript Scraper Pro

Extract subtitles, captions, and transcripts from YouTube videos in JSON, Text, SRT, or VTT formats.

This Actor allows you to scrape transcripts from any public YouTube video. It supports multiple languages, auto-retry mechanisms, and smart proxy handling to avoid blocking.

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⚠️ IMPORTANT: Extraction vs. Translation

Please Read: This scraper extracts existing transcripts uploaded by the creator or auto-generated by YouTube.

• ❌ It DOES NOT perform AI translation on the fly.
• ✅ It ONLY FETCHES languages that are already available on the video.
• 💡 Tip: Always include 'en' (English) as a fallback in your language list to ensure you get a result if your preferred language is missing.

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✨ Key Features

• Multi-Format Output: Get JSON, Plain Text, SRT (Subtitles), and WebVTT in a single run.
• Smart Retry System: Automatically handles connection drops and YouTube blocking.
• Global Support: Works with youtube.com, youtu.be, Shorts, Embeds, and localized domains (e.g., youtube.es).
• Case Insensitive: Handles language codes smarty (e.g., EN, en, En are all valid).

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🚀 How to Use

1. Input Configuration

• Start URLs: Paste one or more YouTube video links.
• Preferred Languages: Enter the language codes you want (priority order).
  • Default: en, ru, es, iw
• Output Format: Choose between specific formats or "All Formats" (Recommended).
• Proxy Configuration: CRITICAL! See the section below.

2. Proxy Configuration (Residential) 🛡️

YouTube aggressively blocks server IPs (Datacenter proxies). To ensure this actor works correctly, you MUST use Residential Proxies.

1. In the Proxy Configuration section, keep "Use Apify Proxy" checked.
2. Click on "Groups" or "Edit".
3. Select Residential (This mimics a real home user connection).
4. If you use "Datacenter" or "Automatic" without Residential, you will likely get Login Page Found or 429 Too Many Requests errors.

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🔗 Supported Link Formats

The scraper automatically detects the Video ID from various URL structures:

• Standard: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvUK2zQBLrY
• Shortened: https://youtu.be/jvUK2zQBLrY
• Shorts: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/jvUK2zQBLrY
• Embed: https://www.youtube.com/embed/jvUK2zQBLrY
• Localized: https://www.youtube.co.il/watch?v=jvUK2zQBLrY

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🌍 Supported Languages & Codes

You can use standard ISO 639-1 codes. The scraper is case-insensitive (e.g., IW and iw both work).

Remember: The language must exist on the specific video you are scraping.

Language	Code	Note
English	en	Most common (Global)
Hebrew	he or iw	עברית
Spanish	es	Español
French	fr	Français
German	de	Deutsch
Russian	ru	Русский
Arabic	ar	العربية
Hindi	hi	हिन्दी
Portuguese	pt	Português (Brazil/Portugal)
Chinese (Simplified)	zh-Hans	简体中文
Chinese (Traditional)	zh-Hant	繁體中文
Japanese	ja	日本語
Korean	ko	한국어
Vietnamese	vi	Tiếng Việt
Dutch	nl	Nederlands
Italian	it	Italiano
Turkish	tr	Türkçe
Polish	pl	Polski
Indonesian	id	Bahasa Indonesia

(And any other standard ISO language code supported by YouTube)

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📦 Output Example

If you select "All Formats", the dataset will contain a rich object for each video:

{
  "videoUrl": "[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvUK2zQBLrY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=*******)",
  "videoId": "****",
  "status": "success",
  "languageFound": "yes",
  "text": "Hello everyone and welcome...",
  "srt": "1\n00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:02,500\nHello everyone...",
  "vtt": "WEBVTT\n\n00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.500\nHello everyone...",
  "json": [
    {
      "text": "Hello everyone",
      "start": 0.0,
      "duration": 2.5
    }
  ]
}

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🛠️ Troubleshooting

Error	Cause	Solution
LANGUAGE_NOT_AVAILABLE	The video does not have subtitles in the requested language.	Add en (English) to your language list as a backup.
TRANSCRIPTS_DISABLED	The video owner has turned off subtitles completely.	Nothing can be done. This video has no captions.
MAX_RETRIES_EXCEEDED	Connection blocked or unstable.	Ensure you are using Residential Proxy. Try again later.
VIDEO_UNAVAILABLE	Video is private, deleted, or region-locked.	Check if the link works in your browser (Incognito mode).

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📞 Support & Feedback

If you encounter any issues or have feature requests, please check the "Issues" tab or create a new issue.