# Douyin Transcript Scraper: 抖音 Video to Text, Punctuated (`quarra/douyin-transcript-scraper`) Actor Douyin (抖音) video transcripts: punctuated simplified Chinese with timestamps, SRT/VTT, share links and app share text accepted. No login. Music-only videos are detected and never charged. - **URL**: https://apify.com/quarra/douyin-transcript-scraper.md - **Developed by:** [Quarra Labs](https://apify.com/quarra) (community) - **Categories:** Social media, Videos, AI - **Stats:** 4 total users, 4 monthly users, 100.0% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks - **User rating**: No ratings yet ## Pricing from $1.00 / 1,000 transcripts This Actor is paid per event. You are not charged for the Apify platform usage, but only a fixed price for specific events. Since this Actor supports Apify Store discounts, the price gets lower the higher subscription plan you have. 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 ## Douyin Transcript Scraper: 抖音 Video to Text, Punctuated Turn Douyin (抖音) videos into text, without an account or API key. Paste video links, `v.douyin.com` share links, or the whole share text copied from the Douyin app, and each video comes back with its transcript in punctuated Chinese (as plain text and as timestamped segments), optional SRT and WebVTT subtitle files, and the video's metadata (author, followers, date, likes, comments, shares, saves, caption, hashtags, sound). Tick **Translate to English** to get an English translation next to the Chinese (paid option, see Pricing). Music-only videos come back as a free `no_speech` record instead of a made-up transcript. Deleted and private videos, photo posts and failures are free too. You pay only for transcripts delivered. ### What we measured On the Apify platform on 13 October 2026, with the default settings (512 MB), on 19 inputs: video IDs, `douyin.com` links, `v.douyin.com` share links, the share text of the Douyin app, an account page and damaged or dead links: - **10 transcripts**, all in punctuated Chinese, from 21 seconds to 11 minutes (28 minutes in all). The 11-minute talk comes back complete: 4,080 characters. - **6 videos without a transcript**, free: 3 songs or music compilations (`no_speech`), 2 videos whose language could not be settled (`uncertain_language`, both music), 1 photo post. - **3 failures** with their reason, free: a private video, a deleted video, and an account page (not supported). - 0 failures on our side; 19 records in about 5 minutes. ### Punctuated Chinese, complete, not guessed Speech-to-text models write Chinese without punctuation unless they are guided: one block of characters with no commas and no full stops, unusable for subtitles, quotes or an LLM. We guide the model to punctuate, then put the punctuation in Chinese form (`，` `。` `？` `！` instead of `,` `.` `?` `!`). On an 11-minute talk, every minute of the transcript is punctuated (8 to 15 marks per 100 characters). Chinese text is joined without spaces, and `wordCount` counts each Chinese character as a word, and punctuation as none. **Fast talkers are transcribed in full.** The model writes at most about 220 tokens for each 30 seconds of audio: very dense speech, common in Douyin's talking-head videos (口播), loses the end of each 30 seconds without a trace. We detect it and transcribe the same audio slowed down by 25% (same pitch), with the timestamps brought back to real time: on an 11-minute talk, the passages that were cut off came back complete (4,080 characters). If the text is still incomplete, a stronger model checks it; a video is never charged as a fragment. **Music is not speech.** On songs, the model is known to invent sentences that were never said, often the credits of the videos it learnt from (「请不吝点赞 订阅 转发 打赏支持明镜与点点栏目」, 「字幕志愿者 …」). We filter those, along with phrases the model is not confident about and loops. A video whose speech is all filtered out is a free `no_speech` record; one where more than 20% of the speech had to be left out is a free `incomplete_transcript` record. Clearly sung lyrics still count as speech. Speech-to-text runs on third-party AI providers: ElevenLabs Scribe v2, the most accurate model in our tests, for most videos (directly or through OpenRouter), and OpenAI's Whisper large-v3 turbo run by Groq for the first videos of some runs and as a backup. The audio is sent to them only to be transcribed. When we call ElevenLabs directly, it stores each transcript on its side: we delete it as soon as we have read it and check that it is gone; if a deletion cannot be confirmed before the run ends, the run log says so. Through OpenRouter, nothing is stored under our account and there is nothing for us to delete; OpenRouter's and ElevenLabs' own data policies apply. ### What you can transcribe | Input | Examples | What you get | |---|---|---| | Videos | `https://www.douyin.com/video/7677683496155991339`, `7677683496155991339` | that video | | Share links | `https://v.douyin.com/…/`, `v.douyin.com/…` | the video they lead to | | Share text from the app | `7.92 复制打开抖音，看看【作品】 https://v.douyin.com/…/ 07/11 Lmr:/` | the video in the text | | Other forms | `douyin.com/…?modal_id=…`, `iesdouyin.com/share/video/…` | that video | Mix them in one run. A video found in two inputs (a link and its share link) is transcribed and charged once. **Videos only.** Douyin shows an account's video list, search results and comments only to signed-in users, and we do not use accounts: an account, search, topic or live link gets a free `invalid_url` record that says so. Paste the links of the videos you want; a live stream link (`live.douyin.com`) is refused the same way, since a live stream is not a saved video. A photo post (图文) link, `/note/…` or `/slides/…` or a share link, gets a free `photo_post` record; a photo post given by its bare ID gets a free `unavailable` record (Douyin gives nothing for it under a video ID). The share text can start or end with the link, hold it in quotes or brackets, or hold two links: each link becomes a video. **Damaged links are refused, never guessed.** A link with a cut or extra character gets a free `invalid_url` record. ### Languages Most Douyin videos are in Mandarin and come back in simplified Chinese (`language: "zh"`). Videos in another language (English, Japanese…) come back in that language: nothing is translated unless you tick Translate to English. We do not trust a single language detection when anything says otherwise: when the caption's script and the detected language disagree, a stronger model settles the language and transcribes the video. If it still cannot be settled, the video comes back as a free `uncertain_language` record, never as a charged guess. `language` is a preference, never an instruction: it changes neither the models used nor the number of passes, and never forces a translation (`requestedLanguageFound: false` when the video is in another language). ### English translation (optional) Tick **Translate to English** (`translateToEnglish: true`) and each transcript also comes back in English, in a `translation` field. The original text always stays in `transcript`, so you can check a sentence or quote it in Chinese. The translation is made from the whole punctuated transcript, sentence by sentence and in order, by a large language model; long talks are translated in full, never summarized. - It is charged only when it is complete (`translationStatus: "ok"`). If it cannot be completed, you get the transcript as usual, `translationStatus: "failed"` with the reason in `translationError`, and nothing is charged for the translation. - A transcript already in English is not translated and not charged (`translationStatus: "notNeeded"`). - Segments and subtitle files stay in the original language. - Names of people, brands and shows are only as good as the speech-to-text heard them: when one matters, check it against the Chinese. ### Output One record per video. A transcript (`status: "ok"`), shortened here: ```json { "status": "ok", "platform": "douyin", "videoId": "7656127265465470262", "url": "https://www.douyin.com/video/7656127265465470262", "author": { "username": "35953766040", "fullName": "易运小霞", "id": "54342049077896", "secUid": "MS4wLjABAAAAC84O2ce3a9AB-uKQTwevPcAHxWlmPB9tFXe91WH4pos", "isVerified": false, "followerCount": 3245, "url": "https://www.douyin.com/user/MS4wLjABAAAAC84O2ce3a9AB-uKQTwevPcAHxWlmPB9tFXe91WH4pos" }, "caption": "如果你容易怯场，不敢上台演讲，在公共场合总是沉默寡言，一开口就结巴，那么这个每日练嘴就是你的必备神器", "title": null, "hashtags": null, "publishedAt": "2026-06-27T17:24:03Z", "viewCount": null, "likeCount": 0, "commentCount": 0, "shareCount": 0, "saveCount": 0, "sound": { "title": "@易运小霞创作的原声", "author": "易运小霞", "isOriginal": true }, "durationSeconds": 23.8, "language": "zh", "transcriptSource": "speech_to_text", "hasSpeech": true, "transcript": "在人前表现自己真的超重要。如果你容易怯场，不敢上台演讲，在公共场合总是沉默寡言，一开口就接吧。那么这个小巧的口袋书，每日恋嘴就是你的必备神器。…", "segments": [ { "start": 0, "end": 1.773, "duration": 1.773, "text": "在人前表现自己真的超重要。" }, { "start": 1.773, "end": 6.41, "duration": 4.637, "text": "如果你容易怯场，不敢上台演讲，在公共场合总是沉默寡言，一开口就接吧。" } ], "segmentCount": 6, "wordCount": 154, "characterCount": 171, "billedMinutes": 1, "input": "7656127265465470262", "inputType": "video", "scrapedAt": "2026-10-13T17:40:18.899Z" } ``` The example shows what speech-to-text is: 「结巴」 heard as 「接吧」, 「练嘴」 as 「恋嘴」. Names, brands and homophones are where it errs most; the meaning of the speech comes through. A video without a transcript comes back as a free record that holds the reason and nothing else: ```json { "status": "missing", "platform": "douyin", "videoId": "7508507662460538146", "url": "https://v.douyin.com/KZXuuMuBTko/", "missingReason": "photo_post", "message": "this is a photo post (图文), not a video", "input": "7.92 复制打开抖音，看看【作品】 https://v.douyin.com/KZXuuMuBTko/ 07/11 Lmr:/", "inputType": "video" } ``` #### Fields that need a word of explanation - `status`: `ok` (transcript, charged), `missing` (the video exists but has nothing to transcribe: `no_speech`, `incomplete_transcript`, `uncertain_language`, `no_audio`, `photo_post`, or `too_long` past your limit; free) or `error` (the link could not be read; free). - `errorCode` and `retryable`: `not_found` (deleted video or expired share link), `private`, `region_blocked`, `not_a_video` (a share link that leads to an account) and `invalid_url` are final, and so is `unavailable` when Douyin gives no video for an ID (often a photo post given by its bare ID). `unavailable` for a video under review, `blocked`, `network`, `transcription_capacity` and `transcription_failed` are worth retrying later (`retryable: true`). `connection_failed` means your own connection settings could not be used: fix them, or keep the default. - `segments`: `start`, `end` and `duration` in seconds. Long Chinese segments are split at the end of sentences (at most 40 characters each, two subtitle lines); the time of each piece is shared out by its number of characters, so the bounds of the original segment are exact and the cuts inside it are close. `includeSrt` and `includeVtt` add ready-to-save `.srt` and `.vtt` files. - `viewCount`: Douyin does not publish view counts to visitors; it is always `null`. Likes, comments, shares and saves are the counts Douyin shows. - `author.username` is the Douyin ID (抖音号) when the author set one; `secUid` is the stable key of the account in Douyin's links. - `filteredSegments`: segments of the raw speech-to-text output left out as non-speech (an invented credit over music, a loop); minutes are billed on the video's length as usual. - `billedMinutes`: started minutes of speech-to-text billed for this transcript. - `translation`, `translationStatus`, `translationError`, `translatedMinutes`: only with Translate to English (see above). `translatedMinutes` is the number of started minutes charged for the translation. The dataset has three views: Overview, Transcripts and Video details. **For a spreadsheet, export the Transcripts view as Excel (XLSX)**: one row per video, and Excel treats every cell as text. The run's summary is the `OUTPUT` record of the default key-value store: per input, transcripts, missing videos, errors and duplicates, plus speech-to-text statistics. ### Input example ```json { "urls": [ "https://www.douyin.com/video/7677683496155991339", "https://v.douyin.com/53V2F5zmZ_c/", "7.92 复制打开抖音，看看【作品】 https://v.douyin.com/KZXuuMuBTko/ 07/11 Lmr:/" ], "includeSrt": true } ``` ### Pricing Pay per result: **$0.001 per transcript** plus **$0.01 per started minute** of speech, plus a **start fee of $0.003 per GB of memory per run** ($0.003 at the default 512 MB). A 1-minute video costs $0.011; a 5-minute talk costs $0.051. **Translate to English** adds **$0.03 per started minute** of the video, only for complete translations: $0.201 for the same 5-minute talk with its translation. Videos without speech, incomplete transcripts, photo posts, deleted or private videos, errors and duplicates are free. Platform usage is included. Your maximum charge per run is never exceeded: the length of each video is read before it is transcribed. A video that would cost more than what is left (with its translation, when you ask for one) gets a free `over_budget` record and the run goes on with the next ones (a shorter video may still fit); the run stops once not even one more transcript fits, and its status says both. `maxItems` caps the transcripts of a run: ask for 10, get 10. Free records are a by-product, not a product: a run stops, and says why, once 100 videos or inputs plus 2 per transcript have given no transcript, or once the audio transcribed for nothing (music-only videos) passes 15 minutes of audio plus the start fee and 40% of what the run has charged: about 18.5 minutes of audio at the default 512 MB, plus about 2.5 minutes per billed minute. A long video is never turned away because of its length: the run stops only once that much audio has really been transcribed for nothing. `maxDurationMinutes` (default 30, at most 60) skips longer videos before anything is transcribed. ### Use cases - Market and trend research in China: what creators in a niche say, searchable, quotable and ready for translation. - Product and brand research: what Douyin sellers and reviewers say about a product (live-commerce scripts, 带货). - Subtitles: punctuated SRT files for your own Douyin videos, for reposting elsewhere. - LLM pipelines: summaries, translation, hooks and topic analysis across hundreds of Chinese videos. ### Limits - **Videos only**: no accounts, search, hashtags, comments or live streams (they need a signed-in account). - **Private videos** and videos only friends can see come back as free `private` records. - **Speech or music.** The speech-to-text service does not return exactly the same text on every pass over the same video; on clear speech it does not matter, on music it can. A video is charged only when its speech is clear; songs are charged only when the lyrics are clear on two passes that agree. - **Speed.** Count about 10 to 30 seconds per video, more for long ones. Our speech-to-text capacity is shared fairly between runs; if it is temporarily used up, videos get free `transcription_capacity` records (`retryable: true`) and the status says when to retry. ### Memory 512 MB is the default and the best setting: the run waits on speech-to-text, not on memory, and the Actor used at most 160 MB in our tests, an 11-minute video included. More memory only shortens the preparation of long videos (our 19 inputs: about 5 minutes at 512 MB, 4 at 1 GB; the maximum is 1 GB). ### FAQ **Is it legal to scrape Douyin transcripts?** This Actor reads only public videos, the way a visitor who is not signed in sees them, and accepts no Douyin terms on your behalf. Transcripts reproduce what people say, which may be protected by copyright and may contain personal data: check that your use (research, analysis, quotation, accessibility) is allowed where you are, and handle personal data under the rules that apply to you (GDPR in Europe, PIPL in China). We keep nothing after the run. With Translate to English, the transcript text is sent to a language-model service that does not keep it to train its models. **Do I need a Douyin account, a Chinese phone number or any setup?** No. Keep the default connection: its cost is included in the price. **Can it translate?** Yes, into English: tick Translate to English ($0.03 per started minute, charged only when the translation is complete). The Chinese transcript always comes with it. **What happens when Douyin changes something?** The Actor runs every day on known videos, so we see a change before you do. A run that fails on our side ends as Failed and charges no transcript. # Actor input Schema ## `urls` (type: `array`): One per line: video URLs (douyin.com/video/…, ?modal_id=…, iesdouyin.com/share/video/…), share links (v.douyin.com/…), the whole share text copied from the Douyin app (the link inside is used), or video IDs. ## `language` (type: `string`): Optional. The language you expect, as a code or a name (zh, yue, en…). It is a preference, not an instruction: each video comes back in the language actually spoken (requestedLanguageFound: false when it differs); it does not translate. For English, tick Translate to English below. Empty: detected for each video. Mandarin comes back in simplified Chinese with Chinese punctuation (，。？). ## `transcriptFormat` (type: `string`): transcript is the whole text in one string; segments is a list of {start, end, duration, text} in seconds. ## `includeSrt` (type: `boolean`): Add an srt field: the transcript as a ready-to-save .srt subtitle file. ## `includeVtt` (type: `boolean`): Add a vtt field: the transcript as a ready-to-save .vtt subtitle file. ## `translateToEnglish` (type: `boolean`): Add an English translation of each transcript in a translation field, next to the original text (which is always kept). Paid option: $0.03 per started minute of translated video, on top of the transcript. Charged only when the translation is complete; a transcript already in English is not translated and not charged. Subtitles and segments stay in the original language. ## `maxDurationMinutes` (type: `integer`): Longer videos get a free too_long record instead of a transcript. Their length is read before anything is transcribed. ## `maxItems` (type: `integer`): Optional cap for the whole run, counted in charged transcripts. Respected exactly. Free records (no speech, deleted, private) do not count; they are bounded separately (100 plus 2 per transcript). ## `proxyConfiguration` (type: `object`): Connection. Keep the default (automatic). Costs are included in the price. ## Actor input object example ```json { "urls": [ "https://www.douyin.com/video/7677683496155991339" ], "transcriptFormat": "both", "includeSrt": false, "includeVtt": false, "translateToEnglish": false, "maxDurationMinutes": 30, "proxyConfiguration": { "useApifyProxy": true } } ``` # Actor output Schema ## `results` (type: `string`): Every video: transcript, segments, metadata, and the free missing/error records with their reason. ## `overview` (type: `string`): One line per video: status, account, language, words, reason. ## `summary` (type: `string`): Per-input counts, videos without speech, errors and speech-to-text statistics. # 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 '' with your token const client = new ApifyClient({ token: '', }); // Prepare Actor input const input = { "urls": [ "https://www.douyin.com/video/7677683496155991339" ], "proxyConfiguration": { "useApifyProxy": true } }; // Run the Actor and wait for it to finish const run = await client.actor("quarra/douyin-transcript-scraper").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 '' with your token. client = ApifyClient("") # Prepare the Actor input run_input = { "urls": ["https://www.douyin.com/video/7677683496155991339"], "proxyConfiguration": { "useApifyProxy": True }, } # Run the Actor and wait for it to finish run = client.actor("quarra/douyin-transcript-scraper").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 '{ "urls": [ "https://www.douyin.com/video/7677683496155991339" ], "proxyConfiguration": { "useApifyProxy": true } }' | apify call quarra/douyin-transcript-scraper --silent --output-dataset ``` ## MCP server setup ```json { "mcpServers": { "apify": { "type": "http", "url": "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=fetch-actor-details,quarra/douyin-transcript-scraper" } } } ``` 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 ` 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/nEste6thalFmTFgFF/builds/t7m1bm0d25WP4J8ot/openapi.json