YouTube transcript generator

When the video has timed captions, each line starts with the time it begins, written as minutes and seconds. A video that runs past an hour keeps counting minutes, so 1 hour 15 minutes reads 75:00. Use the time to find the moment in the video or to cite it.

Press Hide timestamps to see only the words. The Copy button follows that setting. With timestamps showing, each copied line looks like [2:05] followed by the text. With them hidden, you get plain text.

The TXT file has no timestamps even while they show on screen. To keep them in a document, use Copy with timestamps showing. Both files are named after the video's title. The subtitle downloader gives the same two files.

On a desktop browser, YouTube has its own transcript panel. Open the video, expand the description, and choose Show transcript. The panel opens next to the video, and not every video has one. It has no download button, so you select the lines by hand.

Use this page to copy the whole transcript, hide timestamps, or download an SRT file.

• Check the words against the video at the timestamp. Spoken words are easy to mishear, especially names, jargon, and numbers.
• Cite the video title, the creator, and the time, in this pattern: Video title, creator, 12:40.
• To link to the moment, add ?t= and the seconds to a youtu.be link. A quote at 12:40 becomes ?t=760.
• Quote only what you need. The creator owns the words, so do not republish a whole transcript as your own.

• Check that the video is public and has speech. A music-only video has nothing to transcribe.
• Paste the link for one video. Playlist and channel links do not work.
• If the security check says it expired, refresh the page and run it again.
• A very long video can run past the three minutes the tool waits. Try again.
• If you own the video file, the Video to text tool reads uploads instead of links.