How to Get a YouTube Transcript in ChatGPT

What ChatGPT does with a YouTube link

We asked ChatGPT a specific question about a one-hour sourdough video: what rule of thumb does the baker give for temperature, with a quote and a timestamp. It searched the web, found general advice from a baking site, and then said this:

That is the honest version. On a famous video the answer looks much better, and that is the trap. Ask for a summary of Andrej Karpathy's Intro to Large Language Models and you get five tidy bullets with timestamps. Those timestamps are the video's chapter markers from the description: 00:20, 04:17, 11:22, 25:43, 45:43. ChatGPT summarised the table of contents, not the talk.

ChatGPT does say so itself: “If you paste the video transcript here, I can identify the precise quote.” So there are two ways to do that: by hand, or automatically through a connector.

Which way works on your plan

• Pro: custom MCP server with read/fetch access. That is all a transcript needs, so the connector below works fully.
• Business: admins and owners can add it from Plugins and publish it for the workspace.
• Enterprise / Edu: admins, plus any member an admin grants the permission to.
• Plus and Free: custom MCP servers are not offered. Use the copy-paste method further down. It takes ten seconds per video.

This is the state of OpenAI's help center in October 2026. The menu has moved twice this year (it used to be under Settings → Connectors → Advanced → Developer mode). If your screen looks different, look for Plugins or Apps and an option to add a custom MCP server.

Connect TranscriptAPI to ChatGPT (Pro, Business, Enterprise)

1. Get a key

Sign in at transcriptapi.io/login and copy the key from your dashboard. It starts with ta_. The free key comes with 20 credits and doesn't need a card.

2. Add the server

In ChatGPT on the web, open Plugins, press +, then Add custom MCP server. Fill it in like this:

TranscriptAPI

https://api.transcriptapi.io/mcp/ta_your_key

Replace ta_your_key with your key. The key goes in the URL because ChatGPT can't send custom headers, so leave authentication off: there's no OAuth step. Tick I understand and want to continue and choose Create as a plugin. ChatGPT scans the server and should list five tools:

• get_youtube_transcript reads what is said in a video, with timestamps
• search_youtube finds videos by keyword
• get_channel_videos lists a channel's latest uploads
• search_channel_videos finds the video where a channel talks about X
• get_playlist_videos lists a playlist in order

If the scan fails, the key is almost always the cause: a missing ta_, or a space pasted after it.

3. Use it

Start a new chat, type @, pick TranscriptAPI, and ask your question with the link. In ChatGPT the plugin applies to the message you mention it in, so @ it again when a follow-up needs a different video.

This is what the same sourdough question returns once the assistant can read the transcript (shown in Claude, which uses the identical server):

Prompts that only work with the transcript

@TranscriptAPI What does he say about X in this video? Quote him and give the timestamp. [link]

@TranscriptAPI Summarise this in 5 bullets with timestamps, from what is said rather than the description. [link]

@TranscriptAPI Turn this tutorial into a numbered checklist with every setting and value he mentions. [link]

@TranscriptAPI Find the video where @AndrejKarpathy explains tokenization and summarise the first 20 minutes.

@TranscriptAPI Translate the transcript of this video into German. [link]

The fourth prompt chains two tools: a channel search returns Let's build the GPT Tokenizer, and then the assistant reads its transcript. Translation uses extra credits, which scale with the length of the video.

Plus or Free: copy and paste

Without a connector you can still give ChatGPT the real words:

1. Open the free YouTube transcript tool and paste the link. No account needed.
2. Copy the transcript with timestamps.
3. Paste it into ChatGPT with your question, for example: “Here is the transcript of a video. What rule of thumb does he give for temperature? Quote him.”

That is fine for one video. For a channel, a playlist or a daily routine, the connector saves the copying, and ChatGPT can search for the right video by itself.

Things it cannot do

• Videos without captions (creator turned them off, or YouTube never generated any) have nothing to read. The tool says so instead of guessing.
• Private, members-only and age-restricted videos are out of reach.
• It reads captions, not the picture. A silent screen demo stays silent.
• Custom MCP servers are web-only in ChatGPT; the mobile app cannot add them.

Frequently asked questions

Every client, including Claude, Cursor and VS Code, is covered on the MCP server page. To call it from code instead, see the API docs.