YouTube Transcript Scraper

Extract accurate transcripts from any YouTube video with this powerful, easy-to-use Apify Actor. Get complete video transcriptions in multiple languages and formats to enhance content analysis, research, and accessibility.

🚀 Features

• Multi-language Support: Extract transcripts in any available language
• Format Options: Get results in JSON or plain text format
• Fallback Options: Configure language fallback preferences
• Reliable Extraction: Built-in retry mechanism ensures successful transcript retrieval
• Fast Processing: Efficiently processes YouTube videos with minimal resource usage
• Easy Integration: Simple API for seamless integration with your workflow

📋 Use Cases

• Content Research: Analyze video content without watching hours of footage
• SEO Optimization: Extract keywords and topics from popular videos
• Accessibility: Create subtitles or closed captions for your own content
• Data Analysis: Perform text analysis on video transcripts
• Content Repurposing: Transform video content into blog posts, articles, or social media content
• Educational Resources: Create study materials from educational videos
• n8n Integration: Use in n8n workflows to automate video transcript extraction
• Zapier Integration: Connect with Zapier to trigger actions based on video transcripts
• Make.com Integration: Automate tasks with Make.com using video transcripts

⚙️ Input Parameters

Parameter	Type	Description
startUrls	Array	Required. List of YouTube video URLs to process.
format	String	Output format: "text" or "json" (default: "json")
language	String	Preferred language code for the transcript (default: "en")
allowDefaultLanguage	Boolean	If true, falls back to English when preferred language isn't available (default: true)
maxRetries	Integer	Maximum number of retry attempts for failed requests (default: 3)
getFirstAvailableLanguage	Boolean	If true, returns the first available language when preferred language isn't available (default: false)
proxyConfiguration	Object	Proxy settings to be used by the actor. Strongly recommended as YouTube often blocks Apify servers.
proxyConfiguration.useApifyProxy	Boolean	If true, the actor will use Apify Proxy for all connections (default: true)
proxyConfiguration.apifyProxyGroups	Array	Proxy groups to be used by the Apify Proxy (default: []). Residential proxies are recommended for better reliability.
proxyConfiguration.apifyProxyCountry	String	Country to be used by the Apify Proxy (default: "")
proxyConfiguration.proxyUrls	Array	Custom proxy URLs to be used instead of Apify Proxy (default: [])

Input Example

{
    "startUrls": [
        { "url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAkMkVFwAoo" }
    ],
    "format": "json",
    "language": "en",
    "allowDefaultLanguage": true,
    "maxRetries": 3,
    "getFirstAvailableLanguage": false,
    "proxyConfiguration": {
        "useApifyProxy": true,
        "apifyProxyGroups": ["RESIDENTIAL"],
        "apifyProxyCountry": "US"
    }
}

📊 Output

JSON Format (Default)

{
    "title": "Video Title - YouTube",
    "url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAkMkVFwAoo",
    "language": "en",
    "data": {
        "transcription": [
            {
                "start": "0.06",
                "duration": "3.78",
                "text": "Sample transcript text"
            },
            {
                "start": "3.84",
                "duration": "2.76",
                "text": "More transcript text"
            }
        ],
        "language": "en",
        "fullText": "Sample transcript text More transcript text"
    }
}

Text Format

{
    "data": "Sample transcript text\nMore transcript text",
    "title": "Video Title - YouTube",
    "url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAkMkVFwAoo"
}

🔍 How It Works

1. The Actor loads the YouTube video page using a headless browser
2. It extracts the available transcript tracks from the page
3. Based on your language preferences, it selects the appropriate transcript
4. The transcript is processed and formatted according to your specifications
5. Results are saved to the Actor's default dataset

🚦 Limitations

• Only works with YouTube videos that have captions/transcripts available
• Some videos with auto-generated captions may have lower accuracy
• Private or age-restricted videos may require additional authentication
• YouTube often blocks Apify servers, so using proxies (especially residential proxies) is strongly recommended for reliable operation

🔧 Getting Started

Using the Apify Platform

1. Go to the YouTube Transcript Scraper page on Apify
2. Enter the YouTube video URL(s) you want to process
3. Configure optional parameters as needed
4. Run the Actor and retrieve your results

Using the Apify API

const { ApifyClient } = require('apify-client');

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

// Prepare Actor input
const input = {
    startUrls: [{ url: 'https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAkMkVFwAoo' }],
    format: 'json',
    language: 'en',
    proxyConfiguration: {
        useApifyProxy: true,
        apifyProxyGroups: ['RESIDENTIAL'],
        apifyProxyCountry: 'US'
    }
};

(async () => {
    // Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
    const run = await client.actor('your-username/youtube-transcript-scraper').call(input);

    // Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset
    const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
    console.log('Results:', items);
})();

💬 Support

• For issues and feature requests, please create a new issue in the repository