Best YouTube transcript APIs in 2026

If you search for a YouTube transcript API, the first result is usually not an API at all but a Python library: the open-source youtube-transcript-api. It is free, popular and for many projects it is the right answer. It also has a known operational problem once you run it from a server, which is where hosted APIs come in.

This roundup covers six options: the library, the official YouTube Data API and four hosted services. We have not benchmarked them against each other, so there are no speed or success-rate numbers here, only what each project or vendor documents and when each one fits.

How we selected and compared#

• Transcripts of other people's videos. Research, summarization and RAG need transcripts of public videos you do not own. Options that only work for your own channel are noted as such.
• Documented support. The project or vendor must document YouTube transcript support on its own pages.
• Public pricing. Figures come from the vendor's own pricing page, checked October 22, 2026.
• Operational cost. Not just the price per request, but what you must run yourself: proxies, retries, OAuth.
• Output. Timestamped segments, plain text and language selection matter for LLM pipelines.

The comparison table#

The options, one by one#

1. youtube-transcript-api (open-source Python library)

youtube-transcript-api is an MIT-licensed Python library that fetches transcripts and subtitles for a given video. Its README says it needs neither an API key nor a headless browser. It supports a priority list of languages and translating subtitles. For a notebook, a script on your laptop or a one-off research job, it is hard to beat: it costs nothing and you control everything.

The catch is deployment. The README warns that YouTube has started blocking most IPs known to belong to cloud providers, so a library that works locally may raise RequestBlocked or IpBlocked errors on a server. It recommends rotating residential proxies rather than static ones, and supports Webshare and generic proxy configurations. In production, your real cost is the proxy bill plus the time to maintain the setup.

Choose youtube-transcript-api if you work in Python, run from a residential connection or already pay for rotating residential proxies, and want a free, open-source tool you can read and patch yourself.

2. YouTube Data API (official)

Google's YouTube Data API has a captions resource, but it is built for channel owners. The captions.download method requires OAuth scopes, costs 200 quota units per call, and requires the user to have permission to edit the video. The default quota is 10,000 units per day for most endpoints.

Choose the official API if you are fetching captions for your own channel or channels you manage. It is the supported, first-party route for that, and it is free within quota. For other people's videos it usually does not work.

3. Scrape Everything

Our YouTube Transcript API takes any common video URL form or a bare ID and returns timed segments, the joined plain text, the chosen language, whether the track is auto-generated, and the list of available caption languages. Pass lang to pick a track. A transcript costs 1 credit regardless of video length. Packs are one-time (Builder $39 for 25,000 credits, Growth $119 for 100,000, Scale $449 for 500,000), failed requests are refunded and cache hits are free. The same key covers YouTube videos, search, comments and the TikTok Transcript API.

The limits: we return captions that exist. If a video has no caption track, there is no transcript, and we do not run speech-to-text on the audio. Payment is crypto only, via 2328.

Choose Scrape Everything if you run transcripts from a server, do not want to manage proxies, and want a flat 1 credit per transcript with refunds for failures and free repeat reads.

4. ScrapeCreators

ScrapeCreators documents a YouTube transcript endpoint (/v1/youtube/video/transcript) among 18 YouTube endpoints, alongside transcripts for TikTok and Instagram. It has 38+ APIs overall, including LinkedIn, Reddit and Threads, and an MCP server for AI agents. Credits never expire and cache hits cost 0 credits, as stated on their site. Packs run from $47 for 25,000 credits ($1.88 per 1,000 credits) to $497 for 500,000 ($0.99 per 1,000 credits).

Choose ScrapeCreators if you need YouTube transcripts plus Instagram transcripts, LinkedIn, Reddit or Threads from one vendor. See Scrape Everything vs ScrapeCreators.

5. Apify transcript Actors

A search for "youtube transcript" in the Apify Store returns several Actors from different third-party authors, with prices set by each Actor. The platform itself has a free plan with $5 of usage per month, then Starter at $19, Scale at $199 and Business at $999 per month, with scheduling, storage and integrations included.

Choose Apify if transcripts are one step in a bigger automated pipeline that also scrapes other websites, and you want scheduling and storage handled for you. Compare a few Actors' pricing and output first. See Scrape Everything vs Apify.

6. Bright Data

Bright Data's YouTube scraper page says it can extract videos, channels, views, likes, transcripts and more, and that pay-as-you-go is billed only for successful results. That page does not document the transcript output format, so test it before you build on it. Pricing is $1.50 per 1,000 records pay as you go, or $499 per month for 384,000 records on Scale, with a free tier of 5,000 records per month.

Choose Bright Data if you need enterprise contracts, datasets or proxies alongside YouTube data. See Scrape Everything vs Bright Data.

We left out vendors whose sites did not list a YouTube transcript endpoint when we checked. SociaVault, for example, lists YouTube channels, videos, comments and playlists; see Scrape Everything vs SociaVault.

Quick picks#

• Local scripts, research notebooks, zero budget: youtube-transcript-api.
• Captions for your own channel: the official YouTube Data API.
• Server-side transcripts without managing proxies: a hosted API such as Scrape Everything or ScrapeCreators.
• Transcripts as one step in a scheduled, multi-site pipeline: an Apify Actor.
• Enterprise procurement or datasets: Bright Data.

Many teams combine them: the library during prototyping, then a hosted API once the pipeline runs from the cloud. Caption-based tools read the same caption tracks YouTube publishes, so switching later is mostly a matter of mapping field names.

How to test any of these in 10 minutes#

1. Pick five videos: a creator-captioned one, an auto-captioned one, a Short, a non-English video and one with captions turned off.
2. Run them through the library from the machine you will deploy on (not just your laptop), and through one or two hosted APIs.
3. Compare segment timing, language handling, the error you get for the video without captions, and the cost per call.

For Scrape Everything, sign in, create an API key (100 free credits, no payment details needed) and run:

curl -X POST https://api.scrapeeverything.com/v1/youtube/transcript \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $SCRAPEEVERYTHING_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ", "lang": "en"}'

The response includes segments, text, available_languages and meta.credits_charged. Our YouTube transcript guide has Node.js and Python versions and a chunking pattern for LLMs.

FAQ#

Is youtube-transcript-api an official Google API?

No. It is an independent open-source Python library under the MIT license. Google's official route is the YouTube Data API captions resource.

Why does youtube-transcript-api work locally but fail on my server?

Its README says YouTube blocks most IPs known to belong to cloud providers. The library suggests rotating residential proxies; a hosted API handles that for you.

Can I get transcripts for videos without captions?

Not from a caption-based API. If a video has no caption track, you need speech-to-text on the audio, which is a different and more expensive process.

How much does a transcript cost on Scrape Everything?

1 credit per transcript regardless of length: about $1.56 per 1,000 on the Builder pack and $0.90 on the Scale pack. Repeat reads within your cache_days window are free. See pricing.

Can I republish transcripts?

Transcripts are the creator's content. Analysis and search are different from republishing. Read our overview of the legal questions (not legal advice).