YouTube to Text
Paste a YouTube link and get the full transcript instantly. Copy it or download as TXT, SRT, or VTT.
Works with videos that have captions enabled. No audio downloaded — we fetch text only.
2 extractions/day without sign-in. Sign in free for 10/day.
How it works
Paste the link
Any YouTube URL — youtube.com/watch, youtu.be, Shorts, or a raw video ID.
Captions extracted
We fetch existing captions — auto-generated or manually uploaded by the creator.
Copy or download
Get plain text, or download as SRT/VTT for use in video editors.
💡 One thing to know
This tool works when a video has captions. Most popular English videos — lectures, interviews, podcasts, news — have auto-generated captions. Music videos and older content often don't.
No captions? Download the audio and use our AI transcription instead →
Who uses this
Students
Transcribe lectures and tutorials for notes and revision.
Content creators
Repurpose your own video content into blog posts or social.
Journalists & researchers
Extract quotes from press conferences and interviews.
Language learners
Read along with videos to improve comprehension and vocabulary.
FAQ
Is this free?
2 extractions per day without an account. Sign in free for 10 per day.
Does it work on all YouTube videos?
It works on videos that have captions — either auto-generated or manually uploaded. Most popular English videos do. If a video has no captions, we show a clear message and point you to the audio upload tool.
Is this against YouTube's terms of service?
No. We only fetch existing captions that YouTube already makes publicly available. We do not download audio or scrape any private data.
What export formats are available?
Plain text (TXT), SubRip subtitles (SRT with timestamps), and WebVTT (VTT with timestamps). SRT and VTT work with most video editors and players.
What if the video is not in English?
We return captions in whatever language is available on the video, and show all available languages in the result.