Get Transcript

Extract a transcript for any public YouTube video. Optional timestamps and metadata.

The Get Transcript endpoint returns the full caption track for any public YouTube video as predictable JSON. Authenticate with Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY. Each successful 200 response charges 1 credit; 4xx errors, 5xx errors, and 429 rate-limits never debit. Cached responses (X-Cache-Status: HIT) return in 49ms median. The response always includes video_id, language, and a transcript array of { text, start, duration } segments.

GET/api/v2/youtube/transcript1 credit (only charged on HTTP 200)

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Default	Description
video_urlreq	string	—	Video ID, full youtube.com URL, or short youtu.be URL.
format	string	json	Either json (segments) or text (single string).
include_timestamp	boolean	true	Include start and duration on each segment.
send_metadata	boolean	false	Include video title, author, and thumbnail.

Example request

bash

curl -X GET "https://youtubetranscriptapi.com/api/v2/youtube/transcript?video_url=dQw4w9WgXcQ&format=json&include_timestamp=true&send_metadata=true" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY"

Example response — JSON with timestamps and metadata

json

{
  "video_id": "dQw4w9WgXcQ",
  "language": "en",
  "transcript": [
    { "text": "Never gonna give you up",  "start": 0.0,  "duration": 4.12 },
    { "text": "Never gonna let you down", "start": 4.12, "duration": 3.85 }
  ],
  "metadata": {
    "title": "Rick Astley - Never Gonna Give You Up",
    "author_name": "RickAstleyVEVO",
    "author_url": "https://www.youtube.com/@RickAstley",
    "thumbnail_url": "https://i.ytimg.com/vi/dQw4w9WgXcQ/hqdefault.jpg"
  }
}

Example response — JSON without timestamps

json

{
  "video_id": "dQw4w9WgXcQ",
  "language": "en",
  "transcript": [
    { "text": "Never gonna give you up" },
    { "text": "Never gonna let you down" }
  ]
}

Example response — Plain text

When format=text, the transcript is returned as a single string. With include_timestamp=true, segments are prefixed with [start_s].

json

{
  "video_id": "dQw4w9WgXcQ",
  "language": "en",
  "transcript": "[0.0s] Never gonna give you up\n[4.12s] Never gonna let you down"
}

Edge cases

404 — video has no captions, is private, or has been removed.
422 — the video_url didn't resolve to a valid video ID.
408 / 503 — transient upstream error; safe to retry after 1–5s.