YouTube Transcript API
Extract YouTube transcript from any video in any language at scale without worrying about proxy rotation.
- 30-day free trial
- No credit card required
- 1000 credits free
- 30-day free trial
- No credit card required
- 1000 credits free

Features of YouTube Transcript API
Multilingual Captions
Add language parameter to your request and fetch clean captions in Spanish, Portuguese, French, or any other language. Over a hundred tongues supported. Perfect for global users, localised subtitles, and repurposing content in new markets.
Clean JSON Output
Get neatly structured text, start-time, and duration fields that drop straight into your database, search index, or analytics pipeline.
Fast Response
Most calls return the full transcript in just a few seconds, even on long videos. Your workflows stay swift, and users never wait around.
How YouTube Transcript API Gives the Output

> curl "cURL "https://api.scrapingdog.com/youtube/transcripts?api_key=APIKEY&v=bheHjqvkaaI"
{
"transcripts": [
{
"text": "[Music]",
"start": 2.43,
"duration": 5.76
},
{
"text": "[Music]",
"start": 11.09,
"duration": 1.54
},
{
"text": "the alarm strong gene cernan have both",
"start": 12.63,
"duration": 3.37
},
{
"text": "testified against commercial spaceflight",
"start": 16,
"duration": 2.699
},
{
"text": "in the way that you're developing it I",
"start": 18.699,
"duration": 1.98
},
{
"text": "was very sad to see that because those",
"start": 20.679,
"duration": 2.91
},
{
"text": "guys are yeah",
"start": 23.589,
"duration": 3.071
},
{
"text": "you know those guys here's mine so it's",
"start": 26.66,
"duration": 2.039
},
{
"text": "really tough no I wish they would come",
"start": 28.699,
"duration": 2.551
},
{
"text": "and visit and and see the hardware that",
"start": 31.25,
"duration": 1.829
},
{
"text": "was doing here and I think that would",
"start": 33.079,
"duration": 2.641
},
{
"text": "change them like they inspired you to do",
"start": 35.72,
"duration": 3.179
},
{
"text": "this didn't they yes",
"start": 38.899,
"duration": 3.261
},
{
"text": "and to see them casting stones in your",
"start": 42.329,
"duration": 2.371
},
{
"text": "direction difficult",
"start": 44.7,
"duration": 5.96
},
{
"text": "[Music]",
"start": 50.66,
"duration": 4.46
},
{
"text": "you put 90 billion dollars like 50 years",
"start": 56.219,
"duration": 3.39
},
{
"text": "worth of breaks into into solar and wind",
"start": 59.609,
"duration": 2.281
},
{
"text": "to the DISA at Solyndra and Fisker and",
"start": 61.89,
"duration": 3.15
},
{
"text": "Tesla and enter one we had a friend who",
"start": 65.04,
"duration": 2.009
},
{
"text": "said he don't just pick the winners and",
"start": 67.049,
"duration": 0.96
},
{
"text": "losers he picked the losers did you",
"start": 68.009,
"duration": 1.891
},
{
"text": "expect them to cheer you on",
"start": 69.9,
"duration": 2.899
},
{
"text": "so they hoping they were",
"start": 72.799,
"duration": 1.791
},
{
"text": "[Music]",
"start": 74.59,
"duration": 5.429
},
{
"text": "when you had that third failure in a row",
"start": 82.33,
"duration": 4.08
},
{
"text": "did you think I need to pack this in",
"start": 86.41,
"duration": 3.16
},
{
"text": "Devin why not",
"start": 89.57,
"duration": 2.97
},
{
"text": "I don't ever give up I mean I'd have to",
"start": 92.54,
"duration": 3.51
},
{
"text": "be dead or completely incapacitated",
"start": 96.05,
"duration": 3.37
},
{
"text": "[Music]",
"start": 99.42,
"duration": 27.5
},
{
"text": "Tesla is worth more than General Motors",
"start": 126.92,
"duration": 3.03
},
{
"text": "Tesla is worth more than Ford Motor",
"start": 129.95,
"duration": 2.789
},
{
"text": "Company",
"start": 132.739,
"duration": 1.231
},
{
"text": "[Music]",
"start": 133.97,
"duration": 5.99
},
{
"text": "in the history of spaceflight only four",
"start": 145.209,
"duration": 2.61
},
{
"text": "entities have launched a space capsule",
"start": 147.819,
"duration": 2.04
},
{
"text": "in orbit and successfully brought it",
"start": 149.859,
"duration": 2.61
},
{
"text": "back to the earth the United States",
"start": 152.469,
"duration": 2.13
},
{
"text": "Russia China and Elon Musk",
"start": 154.599,
"duration": 4.121
},
{
"text": "[Music]",
"start": 158.72,
"duration": 56.64
},
{
"text": "[Music]",
"start": 218.15,
"duration": 17.1
},
{
"text": "[Music]",
"start": 238.54,
"duration": 5.339
},
{
"text": "so yes I think I think it's possible for",
"start": 246.959,
"duration": 2.431
},
{
"text": "Denari people to choose to be",
"start": 249.39,
"duration": 2.629
},
{
"text": "extraordinary",
"start": 252.019,
"duration": 3
}
]
}
We Simplify Scraping YouTube Transcripts Results for You
Scrape at Scale
Need transcripts for an entire playlist? Fire off hundreds of calls in parallel; our high-concurrency backend keeps pace without breaking a sweat.
Skip YouTube Quotas
Forget OAuth screens and daily caps. Just pass the video ID, Scrapingdog handles the heavy lifting and hands you the caption back every time.
Zero Maintenance
We keep pace with every change YouTube makes, handling captchas, layout tweaks, and rate-limits behind the curtain, so you never touch your code once it’s live.
Scalable Solution
Whether you want the transcript for 1 or 1M videos, your data pipeline will keep delivering the data.
Some Common Use Cases of Video Transcripts
Content Summaries
Save time by reading the main points instead of watching the full video.
Keyword Research
Pull real phrases from top clips and feed them into titles, tags, and ads.
Brand Mentions Audit
See every time your company or product comes up in video dialogue.
Compliance Screening
Scan text for restricted words so campaigns stay within the rules.
Search Inside Video
Tie each line to its timestamp and let users jump to the exact spot they need.
Trend Tracking
Collect transcripts on a topic to spot rising themes before the market catches on.
Testimonial
Transparent & Simple Pricing
LITE
$40/month
- 40000 YouTube Requests
- $1/1k YouTube Requests
- 5 Concurrency
- No Email Support
STANDARD
$90/month
- 200000 YouTube Requests
- $0.45/1k YouTube Requests
- 50 Concurrency
- Email Support
PRO
$200/month
- 600000 YouTube Requests
- $0.33/1k YouTube Requests
- 100 Concurrency
- Priority Email Support
Popular
PREMIUM
$350/month
- 1200000 YouTube Requests
- $0.29/1k YouTube Requests
- 150 Concurrency
- Priority Email Support
LITE
$33.33/month
- 40000 YouTube Requests
- $0.83/1k YouTube Requests
- 5 Concurrency
- No Email Support
STANDARD
$75/month
- 200000 YouTube Requests
- $0.375/1k YouTube Requests
- 50 Concurrency
- Email Support
PRO
$166.66/month
- 600000 YouTube Requests
- $0.277/1k YouTube Requests
- 100 Concurrency
- Priority Email Support
Popular
PREMIUM
$291.66/month
- 1200000 YouTube Requests
- $0.24/1k YouTube Requests
- 150 Concurrency
- Priority Email Support
Need a bigger plan?
Frequently Asked Questions
YouTube doesn’t offer a dedicated “transcript API” per se—but it does allow access to caption tracks (including transcripts) through its official YouTube Data API v3.
The API has some testing credits to use, and then you can upgrade to the paid plan. We do offer a free tool to extract the YouTube Transcript. However, it isn’t a scalable method.
Yes, other than the data from the YouTube Transcript, Scrapingdog has YouTube Search Scraper API, YouTube Channel Scraper API & YouTube Comments Scraper API.
Our development team continuously monitors changes in YouTube layout and updates accordingly to ensure consistent and reliable data extraction.
Each API request consumes a certain number of credits based on the dedicated API you’re using.
For example the Google Search API costs 5 credits per request. So, if you make one request to the Google Search API, it will deduct 5 credits from the available credits in your account. The number of credits required per request can vary depending on the specific API you’re using.
You can find more details about the credit usage for each API in the documentation.
Yes, Scrapingdog’s YouTube transcript API is scalable, i.e you can use the API within your apps or SaaS and allow your customers to use uninterrupted access to captions from videos.